Syracuse Basketball: Buddy Boeheim contending for national POY honors

Syracuse basketball senior shooting guard Buddy Boeheim is just getting underway in the 2021-22 campaign, and the national expectations for him are quite lofty, at least as far as pre-season prognostications go.

The 6-foot-6 Boeheim caught fire toward the end of last season, helping the Orange to reach the Sweet 16. And now he’s eyeing a stellar senior year, buoyed by a roster filled with deep threats that, hopefully, will provide Boeheim with ample scoring opportunities from the perimeter, in the mid-range and around the rim.

Boeheim’s pre-season accolades are plentiful. He’s landed on numerous All-American teams ahead of the 2021-22 stanza. He’s a top-10 returning player, a top-25 overall player, and on the pre-season All-ACC first squad.

To top it off, in recent days Boeheim has gotten named to the pre-season watch list for several national player of the year awards. Let’s take a look.

Syracuse basketball shooting guard Buddy Boeheim should contend for national honors.

Boeheim is on the pre-season watch list for the 2022 Naismith Trophy as well as the 2022 NABC Division I Player of the Year award. Both of these honors are expected to be unveiled around the time of the 2022 Final Four.

As we noted in another recent column, Boeheim is also one of 20 players on the pre-season watch list for the 2022 Jerry West Award, which annually honors the top shooting guard across the country. Another quick update here, as on Tuesday afternoon Boeheim was included on the pre-season watch list for the 2022 John R. Wooden Award.

For all of these national awards, which players are on the watch lists can change throughout the season, before these lists are trimmed down and, ultimately, a winner is revealed.

I truly believe that Boeheim can make a run at these sorts of awards, although competition is, naturally, intense. He’s going up against elite players who suit up at a variety of the sport’s heavyweight teams, such as Duke, Gonzaga, Michigan, Kansas, Kentucky, Oregon, UCLA, Alabama, Villanova, Memphis, Purdue, Ohio State and Baylor, the defending national champion.

Obviously, for Boeheim to remain in contention for national awards, he will have to put up some really impressive numbers during his senior campaign. Additionally, the Orange will have to perform at a high level as a collective unit.

As a sophomore, Boeheim averaged more than 15 points per contest. Last year, in his junior stint, he tallied nearly 18 points a game. Boeheim has also proven one of the top 3-point shooters in the Atlantic Coast Conference over the past two terms.

Since the ‘Cuse enters 2021-22 with so many offensive weapons in its line-up, Boeheim could pace the squad in scoring, even if his scoring average is at or below what he generated as a junior.

I could envision Boeheim averaging 16 to 17 points per encounter, and doing so while having higher shooting percentages. For me, it’s not just about scoring per se for Boeheim, but rather, him improving on defense and garnering a good number of assists and rebounds every time he’s out there on the floor.