CU hooper on list for best players in country as season tips Monday
Nov 6, 2023, 2:01 PM
Tad Boyle’s 13th year leading the Colorado Buffaloes could be the best one as his team is full of productive returning players, exciting young prospects and is led by the stalwart head coach.
Perhaps the Buffs most notable returner is senior Tristan da Silva, one of 50 in the country on Monday, named to the watch list for the 2023-24 Jersey Mike’s Naismith Trophy Men’s Basketball Player of the Year. Da Silva was an All-Pac-12 Conference First Team player as a junior a season ago, leading Colorado at 15.9 points per game on just under 50 percent shooting. His 54 3-pointers and 44 steals led the Buffs and his 168 rebounds were second on the team.
The forward had already been one of 20 members of the Karl Malone Award Watch List for the nation’s best power forward, and was named to Blue Ribbon Yearbook’s Preseason All-America Fourth Team and tabbed Preseason All-Pac-12 by both league media and the Almanac, while also being named the latter publication’s 56th best player in the nation. He’s looking to take home some of these honors, as did his brother Oscar da Silva for his mighty career at Stanford.
Meanwhile, the younger da Silva might not even be Colorado’s best player. The team will boast fellow upperclassman coming off conference honors in guard KJ Simpson, who scored 15.9 points per game while tossing a team-best 111 assists a season ago.
And yet da Silva nor Simpson is who many think could take Boyle’s squad into the top tier of the Pac-12. It’s freshman Cody Williams, the top recruit in all of the 2023 class according to On3 that has those in Boulder eyeing titles.
A 2023 graduate of Perry High School in Arizona, Williams is expected to be one of the ten best freshmen in the country. The brother of the NBA’s third-place vote-getter in the Rookie of the Year race last year Jalen Williams, Cody is the first five-star recruit in Boulder since David Harrison. His 18 points per game led Perry to the 2023 Arizona Open Division state championship with a 30-1 record; and earned him a McDonald’s All-American nod, becoming the fourth Buffalo to play in that classic. Williams spent the summer with Boyle playing for Team USA’s U-19 team.
The trio along with TCU transfer big man Eddie Lampkin Jr. along with Colorado high school stand-out forward Assane Diop and productive local returners Luke O’Brien and Jullian Hammond have the Buffs at 66/1 to win a national title. Their season will tip on Monday with the home opener against Townson.
All of college basketball kicks off this week with the CU women’s team ranked and facing reigning title winners LSU in Vegas. Away from Boulder, CSU’s Isaiah Stevens also was named to the watch list for the 2023-24 Jersey Mike’s Naismith Trophy Men’s Basketball Player of the Year.
