Many of the weekend’s best college basketball games were blowouts, thus today seems like a good time to continue talking about the top freshmen. Two weeks ago, I looked at freshmen who were not consensus elite recruits, but who have surprised us this season. This week I look at whether RSCI Top 100 recruits ranked 61-100 have lived up to the hype. Let’s call this the Josh Hart watch after the Villanova freshman who was ranked only 94th last year but who had a brilliant 127 ORtg in his first season while playing major minutes.

But before we get to the numbers, let’s see if I can weave one of the weekend’s games into a longer introduction:

The Roosevelt Jones Game

I predicted that Jerian Grant’s return from injury would cause Notre Dame to bounce back this season. If you looked at the splits, and you looked at the stats, Grant was clearly a high impact player. But I wasn’t quite as sure about Butler’s Roosevelt Jones. Jones wasn’t as efficient or as high scoring. He clearly mattered defensively, but it was hard to know if Butler’s collapse last year was tied to the loss of Jones or the team’s lack of depth at other positions.

But based on what we have seen so far this season, Roosevelt Jones return has led to a Jerian Grant-like turnaround. And in Sunday’s game against Georgetown, Jones was almost unstoppable, scoring 28 points and relentlessly taking the ball to the basket. But that’s what made the end of the game so fascinating.

With Butler up one point with about 50 seconds left, and Jones dribbling beyond the arc, Georgetown’s Jabril Trawick made one of the best on-ball steals I’ve ever seen. He got low, reached out, and simply ripped the ball away from Jones. Jones slapped the floor in frustration.

But the game wasn’t over. After Georgetown scored to take a one point lead, Jones drove to the basket and gave Butler the lead right back. Then after Georgetown hit a three to take a two point lead, Jones had the ball one more time. He drove along the right side of the court, and Georgetown’s D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera blocked Jones shot as time expired.

I’ve never seen such an amazing back-and-forth with one player, both making amazing plays, and the defense making amazing plays in the same sequence. For Georgetown, whose defense has improved from 107th to 57th, it was a confirmation that the defense could win a game.

But the Hoyas also got a huge boost from freshman Isaac Copeland, who hit what turned out to be the go-ahead three. The comparison between Copeland and Georgetown’s LJ Peak is a perfect example of why we need to be careful interpreting any freshmen stats. This is only a snap-shot of evolving players.

Georgetown’s Copeland was the higher ranked player out of high school. Copeland ranked 28th while Peak ranked 63rd. But Peak proved to be the more confident player in summer-league play and in practice, and he’s been the early star. Peak is scoring 9.5 PPG to Copeland’s 4.5 PPG. Advanced stats followers would tell you that this is all about playing time. Because of Peak’s struggles from three in recent weeks, Copeland’s ORtg Is actually 10 points higher than Peak’s ORtg. But if you want to argue that Copeland is the better player, I’ll strongly disagree with that line of reasoning. Copeland has played more minutes against backups, while Peak has been starting, and teams have been game-planning to take away Peak’s strengths.

And on Sunday we saw the result of a defense that had not game-planned against Copeland. Copeland had taken just six threes since mid-December and made just one in the stretch of games leading up to Saturday. And thus on the final play, when the 6’9” forward went towards the corner, the Butler defense didn’t even flinch. It wasn’t worth covering him out there. But Copeland is a young star, and he was not afraid of the moment. And with ice-water in his veins, he nailed the come-from-behind, game-winning three.

As great as that play was, don’t discount what Peak has done as a starter. Peak has been great at getting steals, and great at attacking in transition. Based on over 10 years of stats, the average RSCI freshman ranked 61-100 scores just over 5 points per game, has an ORtg of 96, uses just 19% of the team’s possessions, and plays only 14 minutes per game. As the first chart shows, Peak is exceeding all those numbers in the early going.

I don’t list steal rates or block rates, because those can be a bit deceiving for players that rarely play. Players marked with a star are players that our SI projections thought were more likely to play a major role right away. These players weren’t necessarily further along, but they had playing time available to them with their respective teams.

Kansas guard Devonte Graham has been out with a turf-toe, but I thought he played well on Saturday. He had a couple of huge steals and his transition passing helped Kansas make a comeback. The real problem was that Kansas kept getting beat in transition on defense. There was at least one play in the second half where Iowa St. beat Kansas down the floor after a made Kansas basket. That was particularly back-breaking.

I thought Louisville was a preseason Top 10 team because I thought one of the many elite freshmen would break out with some complimentary scoring. That hasn’t happened. Chinanu Onuaku has started a number of games, but even when he grabs offensive rebounds (something he does at an impressive 16% clip), he tends to kick the ball out or turn it over. While he’s using 16% of his team’s possessions, that’s mostly turnovers. He takes only 11% of the shots on the floor. Quentin Snider (the highly ranked Louisville guard prospect) is the bigger problem, and I will discuss him in a future week.

In the preseason, when we see that someone is a Top 100 recruit, we expect them to be great right away. But as these numbers show, not everyone dominates at the college level immediately. A lot of these players will become stars as sophomores and juniors.

That said, there are players where I see it and I don’t see it. Marquette’s Sandy Cohen clearly has athleticism, but the game looks like it is going too fast for him on defense. Marquette can’t afford to play him more, even if he has shown some offensive touch. On the flip side, I don’t understand at all why Rivals and ESPN had Michigan St.’s Tum Tum Nairn in their Top 100. Nothing about Nairn’s game has impressed me so far. I’m looking forward to when Tom Izzo turns him into a star in a few years and I have to eat my words.

Clemson’s Donte Grantham might be the most under-rated freshmen in today’s column, if only because of all the things he brings to the table. He has 18 blocks, 14 steals, and he’s been carrying a scoring load. Grantham had a team-leading 16 points in the win against Syracuse this weekend.

Purdue’s Isaac Haas and AJ Hammons have alternated as Purdue’s starting center, and both have been dominant at times. Haas might have the highest upside in this table because he’s been effective as a high volume scorer.

Watching San Diego St.’s come-from-behind win against UNLV, we saw why the word “freshman” is so important. With SDSU down just two points, Trey Kell had a pair of possessions where he went down the court and took a terrible off-balance shot. Commentator Doug Gottlieb was screaming at him to make better decisions. So of course, Kell came down the court on the next two possessions, and scored the game-tying and go-ahead basket. With elite freshmen, you take the bad with the good.

Two side notes on team’s making mistakes:

-At 4:53 left in the Kansas St. vs Baylor game, Kansas St. made an overhead pass from five feet beyond the arc. The ball bounced between two Baylor defenders, and found a Kansas St. player for a wide-open lay-up. That cannot happen! The defense cannot be paying that little attention. Kansas St. won by two.

-There are certain commentators that you expect to be critical like Gottlieb or Dan Dakich, but Stephen Bardo is not one of them. Watching the Minnesota vs Rutgers game, Bardo became frustrated enough with Rutgers lackadaisical ball-handling that at one point he compared Rutgers to a junior high team. Also, what was Rutgers thinking in their game-plan against Andre Hollins? Yes, Hollins was shooting 20% in the Gophers 0-5 start in Big Ten play, but he is Minnesota’s best player. Hollins was shooting 20% because teams were game-planning to take him away. Rutgers acted like he was shooting 20% because he wasn’t very good, played help defense off him on multiple occasions, and that led to Hollins getting 31 points. I think Rutgers should take this as a compliment. By winning a couple of games (and playing Maryland close), we actually have reason to complain when the team makes mistakes, instead of just assuming it will happen.

-Justin Bibbs missed Sunday’s game against North Carolina with a concussion, but he has played the most minutes, and scored the most points of any freshman rated 61-100.

-Trayvon Reed is a very good per-minute rebounder, and Auburn needs size. But he is so far behind in practice after enrolling mid-semester that the coaching staff doesn’t trust him to play major minutes right now.

-As Luke Winn noted at SI earlier this year, Domantas Sabonis should be much higher than his current ranking, but not all the US scouting services evaluated him. I wonder how many fans remember Arvydas Sabonis as a hulking bruiser and don’t realize that Domantas is just a relatively skinny 18-year-old. Domantas is rebounding at a high level today based on skill, but as his frame fills in, his ceiling could be scary.

-With all the love being heaped on Maryland’s Melo Trimble and his incredible ability to get to the line, I don’t think enough people have noticed Jared Nickens. Nickens is a 39% three point shooter. And while Michal Cekovsky’s playing time has been limited lately, he is still a disruptive force given his height. Maryland’s turnaround isn’t just about one freshman exceeding expectations, the whole freshmen class has been solid.

You’ll notice that #74 Memphis’ Dominic Magee is not listed because he has transferred. Meanwhile, #79 San Diego St.’s Zylan Cheatem is out for the year with an injury. And #73 Creighton’s Ronnie Harrell, #94 Xavier’s Makinde London, and #96 Villanova’s Mikal Bridges appear to be red-shirting based on team choice.

Along those lines, here are five players ranked 61-100 in 2013 who did not play last season. The elite redshirt freshmen:

In theory, redshirting should make a player better, but in Baylor and Memphis’ case, that hasn’t meant an immediate impact for their elite recruits.

Ohio St.’s Kam Williams is in a real slump. He’s just 4 for 18 in Big Ten play and he has seen his playing time cut drastically.

Jordan Bell was a 6’7” high school senior. He had to sit out last year due to eligibility issues, but now he’s listed as a 6’9” big man for the Oregon Ducks, and he has a ridiculous 63 blocks so far this year. Maybe he just looks short next to 7 foot Washington center Robert Upshaw, but I think 6’9” might be a slight exaggeration. Regardless, his hops are not an exaggeration. He’s fantastic at getting up in the air and chasing down blocks from behind in transition.