Perhaps lost in Ohio State’s recent swoon on the basketball court — to the tune of three losses in the last four games, including two humiliating blowouts — is that a star is emerging off the Buckeye bench.
Redshirt sophomore guard Kam Williams not only has the best hair on the Ohio State team, but he also is putting up some sick numbers that have him on pace to perhaps destroy one of the school’s single-season records.
Back in 2010-11, Jon Diebler connected on 114 of his 227 3-point attempts for the season. He hit 50.2% of his triples that year to set the Ohio State single-season mark for 3FG%. For a player to hit better than half his treys is outside shooting at an elite level in college basketball, especially when taking so many attempts.
Williams isn’t on pace to take nearly as many attempts, owing largely to his role off the bench. Kam is currently second among all Big Ten players on the season in 3FG% (to Michigan’s Duncan Robinson, 51.6%), hitting 49.2% from downtown in all games — just a few tenths of a percentage point behind the man they call “Threebler” for his long-range prowess. But Williams has gotten stronger as the games took on more meaning.
| Non-Conference Games | B1G Games | |
|---|---|---|
| FGM/FGA | 31/65 | 29/53 |
| FG% | 47.7% | 54.7% |
| 3FGM/3FGA | 14/34 | 17/29 |
| 3FG% | 41.2% | 58.6% |
| PPG | 6.2 | 11.4 |
| Double-digit Games | 2 | 4 |
| Scoreless Games | 3 | 0 |
In 13 non-conference games, Kam buried 14 of his 34 tries from distance for a respectable 41.2% clip. However, his light started burning even brighter once the B1G games started. Since conference play opened, Williams has hit 17/29 from deep, for a blistering 58.6%. To put that into perspective, that’s the kind of shooting percentage that Ohio State’s elite post players amass. Players throwing down a lot of dunks and getting layups shoot in the high 50s and into the low 60s, percentage-wise. Kam is doing it from long distance in hotly contested Big Ten games, against better competition (for the most part) than he faced in the non-conference portion of the schedule.
The 6-foot-2 product of Mount St. Joseph’s in Baltimore has hit at least two triples in four of the seven B1G games in 2015-16, and at least one in every conference game. In his best recent outings, he hit 5/9 at Northwestern, 3/6 against Rutgers, and 4/5 at Purdue. The sharpshooting is part of an overall renaissance in his game since the more meaningful contests began. Averaging only 6.2 points per game in the 13 non-conference games, Williams has since averaged 11.4 points per game in the B1G.
In B1G play only, Williams is three full percentage points against the next best distance shooter — Michigan’s Aubrey Dawkins — with 17 more attempts taken. It’s three more percentage points back to third-place Eron Harris of Michigan State, who has 10 fewer attempts than Kam.
Three teams held him scoreless in the non-conference schedule — Mt. St. Mary's, Louisiana Tech, and Virginia. Yet he has scored at least five points in every conference match-up. He reached double figures only twice in the non-conference slate but four times in B1G play.
Here’s what Williams has done since the conference opener:
- Vs. Minnesota: 3/5 overall, 1/2 from deep, 7 points
- Vs. Illinois: 3/6 overall, 2/4 from deep, 10 points
- At Northwestern: 8/13 overall, 5/9 from deep, 21 points
- At Indiana: 2/4 overall, 1/2 from deep, 5 points
- Vs. Rutgers: 4/9 overall, 3/6 from deep, 14 points
- At Maryland: 4/8 overall, 1/1 from deep, 9 points
- At Purdue: 5/8 overall, 4/5 from deep, 14 points
Although it’s easy to draw the dividing line between non-conference and conference games, the production spurt really started in the final pre-conference match-up against South Carolina State. In that game, Williams hit 5/8 from the floor, including 2/3 from the arc, scoring 12 points. He’s been at least .500 from long distance in every game since, and above .500 from anywhere on the floor in all but the Rutgers game (4/9 overall).
If the season ended today, Kam would have the school’s second best 3-point shooting percentage season of all time. Behind Diebler’s 2010-11 season percentage of 50.2% is William Buford’s 44.2%, set in the same year. There’s no telling if Williams can keep up his torrid shooting for the remainder of the season, but if he can maintain his current pace, he’ll easily surpass Threebler.
In some respects, what Williams is doing is even more impressive than what Diebler did in his record-setting year. Sure, Kam hasn’t lofted nearly as many shots, but he also has to come off the bench cold. Diebler started in 2010-11, playing nearly 36 minutes per game. While that might save Kam's legs more, Williams comes in and out of the lineup, averaging just under 19 and a half minutes. He’s got to get accustomed to game speed quickly, without a warm-up.
In addition, Diebler had an incredible veteran team around him that year, with the notable inclusion of Jared Sullinger’s considerable post presence. With Sully on the block drawing double teams, and with guys like Buford lurking, Threebler was often waiting and wide open on kickout passes.
While Ohio State in 2015-16 is an enigmatic team, with a variety of players that can step up on any given night, there is far less need for opposing teams to double down on Trevor Thompson or Daniel Giddens than there was with Sullinger. Rather than simply waiting to catch and shoot, as Diebler often did, Kam is more apt to have to work hard for his openings, swinging quickly from side to side with explosive cuts off screens to try to get a step on his defender to give himself enough room to launch a shot.
Sure, Diebler did some of that as well, but Williams has made a living for much of the Big Ten schedule this season running the baseline and curling in on the left side of the floor, where he’s been lethal. He’s also been a monster of late on fast-break treys, which was an area in which Diebler also excelled in 2010-11.
Without the star presence of Sullinger or the smooth shooting of Buford to protect him, Williams has nevertheless been emerging as one of the conference’s most deadly long-range shooters.
It's far too early to anoint Williams ahead of someone as prolific as Diebler. But watching Kam's progression has been impressive and as a redshirt sophomore, he's probably not yet approaching his ceiling.
If he can continue at anywhere near his current pace, Williams could end up Ohio State’s sui generis distance shooter.
