Is Oklahoma star Trae Young trying to do too much?

Lindsay Schnell, USA TODAY Sports Published 1:23 p.m. ET Jan. 22, 2018

SportsPulse: USA TODAY Sports' Lindsay Schnell and Scott Gleeson discuss why predicting this year's tournament favorites is harder than ever. USA TODAY Sports

If I were Trae Young, I’d be confused.

For all of the basketball season up until last week, most people who watch or cover college hoops regularly had anointed Young — the 6-2 freshman guard who plays for Oklahoma and is often compared to Steph Curry — the 2017-18 player of the year. Forget about other, more hyped freshmen that you heard about in the preseason such as Marvin Bagley III at Duke, DeAndre Ayton at Arizona or everyone who plays for Kentucky. Young, who leads the nation in points and assists, already had the award locked up.

Then Young went and had a few rough games, two of which were Oklahoma losses, and people want to point the finger and say he’s the reason why. Those losses included Saturday in Stillwater, when the Sooners fell to unranked Oklahoma State 83-81 in overtime (despite 48 points from Young). Tuesday, No. 11 Oklahoma faces another ranked opponent when it hosts No. 5 Kansas.

In his last three games (an overtime win vs TCU, then losses to Kansas State and OSU) Young scored a combined 111 points (37 per game), passed out 21 assists and turned the ball over 28 times. The troubling stat is that it took him 29 shots per game in that stretch to put up those numbers. That’s almost 10 more attempts per game than his season average. Through 18 games, Young is averaging 30.5 points on 20.5 field goal attempts. He also gets to the free throw line 9.7 times a game and has attempted 171 free throws, sixth-most in the country.

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Something else to consider as you study the stat sheets: Against TCU and Oklahoma State, Young played 40 and 43 minutes, respectively.

In short, you can’t have it both ways. Young is the reason everyone wants to tune in to watch Oklahoma play. He’s not selfish, evidenced by his assist numbers and, again, his typically reasonable field goal attempt average. (He’s shooting 44.3% from the field; in the three-game stretch we’re examining he hit 42.5%.) My hunch is that the last few games, especially Saturday late against the Cowboys, he’s guilty of something a lot of us can relate to: He makes mistakes when he’s tired.

Yes, he’s turned the ball over a lot in recent games, but he’s played a brand of uptempo, flashy basketball all season, and guards who take risks often throw the ball away unnecessarily. You take the good with the bad.

He can be casual with the ball, to the point where it would drive an old-school basketball purist crazy. But let’s also remember that like most freshmen, Young has most recently been playing a lot of AAU ball, where fundamentals are not valued as much as a deep three or flashy behind-the-back pass. (Though as a sidenote, one Big 12 coach told me earlier this season that what’s often overlooked about Young is how fundamentally sound he is; he can break the conventional rules of basketball because he’s already learned how to play within them.)

And let’s not forget that he happens to play in the toughest conference in the country, a league where a lot of teams struggle to win consistently.

Bottom line: Young has had a few freshman moments in the last week. That’s bound to happen. Bad habits — like a poor shot selection — tend to reappear in pressure-packed situations, especially when tired. But he’s the reason Oklahoma is in its current position, at 14-4 overall, and he’s the reason they’ll go to the NCAA tournament. There’s no need for him to change his style.

Virginia Cavaliers guard Nigel Johnson (23) goes up for a shot against Wake Forest Demon Deacons center Doral Moore (4) in the second half at Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum. Jeremy Brevard, USA TODAY Sports

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