Duke freshman Vernon Carey is among 5 finalists to win the Naismith Award, which goes to college basketball’s best player, but did not appear on the ballot to win ACC Player of the Year. The reason? Coach K did not nominate him.
Carey would’ve won had he been nominated instead of teammate Tre Jones, who took home the award Monday. Carey received more All-ACC votes than anybody in the conference. The issue with making both players eligible is voters potentially splitting their votes among the two Duke players making it more likely a non-Blue Devil would win.
Mike Krzyzewski picked the wrong guy. He said he would love to have been able to nominate both, which he could have since he did it last season with Zion Williamson and RJ Barrett. Even if both were able to be selected, Carey would’ve won because without him on the ballot, Jones had double the votes of everybody else.
Virginia did a similar thing and it backfired, nominating Kihei Clark for the ACC Defensive Player of the Year instead of Mamadi Diakite. Diakite received many more votes for All-Defensive Team, and Clark fell well short in the voting.
I’m not sure fans care about this, but it should be fixed. The best player in the ACC is not named the best player in the ACC because his coach didn’t allow him to be. As a dumb guy, I can tell you that’s dumb.
I’m now hoping Carey is named the national player of the year despite not being named the best player in his own conference.
Keep the conversation going by reaching out to Erik Buchinger on Twitter or email erik@deceptivespeed.com.