100 Most Valuable Men's College Basketball Players in VABG 1939 to Now

After playing hundreds of simulated Value Add Basketball games using 300 great college basketball team cards that I researched and calculated myself, this is my updated list of the 100 greatest college basketball players in our game - which includes most players in history.

In addition to overall level and play and impact on the game, we looked at Win Shares per 10 team games played, which allows meaningful comparison across eras with vastly different schedules. About two-thirds of the players on this list have published college Win Share data; for the remaining one-third, I produced estimates using the same Value Add methodology.

To clarify the scale: a player with 4.8 Win Shares per 10 games is worth roughly five wins for every ten games his team plays.

For example, Kansas went 42–8 during Wilt Chamberlain’s tenure. A value of 4.8 WS per 10 games credits Wilt with roughly 24 of those wins, leaving the remaining 18 wins attributable to his teammates, while the team lost eight games overall. This framing makes it possible to compare players fairly across teams, eras, and rule sets. Wilt was clearly the most valuable player to his team, though I rank him third overall.

One caveat on "Most Valuable" vs. "Greatest" (which I originally called this list) is that it is hard to make the list if there were two truly great players on your team because the team likely could have won a lot of games without you. There are two duos on this list - UNC's Michael Jordan and James Worthy and Ohio State's Jerry Lucas and John Havlicek. However, in other cases to site even my alma mater - neither Jimmy Butler or Jae Crowder made the list for the season they played together but when it was just Butler his value went up. The same with Bo Ellis and Butch Lee or with Dean Meminger and Jim Chones. Every university will have similar examples where a tremendously valuable player does not make the top 100 list because they team had another all-time superstar. Also these are only players in the game, and we try to get at least one team per school but also not to have too many teams from any given school so some players were not considered because their team is not among the 300 in the game.

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Why Anthony Davis Ranks 7th All-Time

The ranking most people will debate is Anthony Davis at No. 7. Based on my Value Add Basketball rankings that were covered in this Sports Illustrated article more than a decade ago, I found that Davis was by far the most valuable college basketball player of the 21st century, based on his performance during Kentucky’s 2012 national championship season—ironically, I was in attendance at the only game that team lost (at Indiana).

If players throughout history had competed under the same rules and conditions, I don’t believe there would be any debate that Anthony Davis belongs among the ten greatest college players of all time.

The primary reason Davis is often ranked below many 20th-century stars is structural, not performance-based. Davis played in the one-and-done era, meaning his entire college résumé consists of his freshman season. In contrast, during most of the 20th century, elite players were not allowed to play varsity basketball as freshmen, meaning their first college action came as sophomores—after a full year of development.

The Value Add Basketball research mentioned above shows that MOST CAREER improvement in a player’s career almost always occurs between the freshman and sophomore seasons.

In other words:

• If all great players in history had been limited to only their freshman seasons, Anthony Davis would clearly rank among the top 10 college players ever.

• Conversely, if Davis had been required to sit out as a freshman and then played sophomore and junior seasons at Kentucky, as most historical greats did, he almost certainly would have built a résumé universally recognized as top-10 all-time.

Thus, when all players are evaluated under equal conditions, Anthony Davis emerges as one of the greatest 10 college basketball players in history. The only reason this isn’t universally accepted is that the rules changed, not the level of dominance.

If we ranked only the 65 players on this lost for whom we have actual Win Shares, Kareem and Walton are 1st and 2nd, and Davis is 5th - and tracing normal improvement range Davis would have very likely had the best Win Share in history if he played a sophomore season.

And yes, Michael Jordan is the greatest overall player - but considering only all college careers only with no consideration of the pro career that followed, I have him 4th.

Rank	Player (School)	WS / 10	Draft Pick (Overall)
1	Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (UCLA)	4.8	1
2	Bill Walton (UCLA)	4.5	1
3	Wilt Chamberlain (Kansas)	4.8	1
4	Michael Jordan (North Carolina)	2.6	3
5	Oscar Robertson (Cincinnati)	4.2	1
6	Bill Russell (San Francisco)	3.9	2
7	Anthony Davis (Kentucky)	3.9	1
8	Pete Maravich (LSU)	3.8	3
9	Jerry West (West Virginia)	3.7	2
10	Elvin Hayes (Houston)	3.6	1
11	David Robinson (Navy)	4	1
12	Jerry Lucas (Ohio State)	3.5	2
13	Tim Duncan (Wake Forest)	3.4	1
14	Larry Bird (Indiana State)	3.3	6
15	Julius Erving (UMass)	3.4	12
16	John Havlicek (Ohio State)	3	7
17	Elgin Baylor (Seattle)	3.3	1
18	Kevin Durant (Texas)	3.5	2
19	Rick Barry (Miami)	3.3	2
20	Shaquille O'Neal (LSU)	3.1	1
21	Hakeem Olajuwon (Houston)	3	1
22	Carmelo Anthony (Syracuse)	3	3
23	Ralph Sampson (Virginia)	3.1	1
24	Bob Cousy (Holy Cross)	3.2	10
25	Magic Johnson (Michigan State)	2.7	1
26	Danny Manning (Kansas)	3.2	1
27	Bob Pettit (LSU)	3.1	2
28	Clyde Lovellette (Kansas)	3	1
29	Irv Torgoff (Long Island University)	3.6	50
30	Bob McAdoo (North Carolina)	3	2
31	Wes Unseld (Louisville)	2.9	2
32	Christian Laettner (Duke)	2.6	3
33	James Worthy (North Carolina)	2.2	1
34	Frank Kaminsky (Wisconsin)	3.4	9
35	Reggie Miller (UCLA)	2	11
36	Dwyane Wade (Marquette)	2.9	5
37	Dave Bing (Syracuse)	2.9	2
38	Scott May (Indiana)	2.4	2
39	Isiah Thomas (Indiana)	2.4	2
40	Patrick Ewing (Georgetown)	2.9	1
41	Vince Carter (North Carolina)	2.1	5
42	Shane Battier (Duke)	2.7	6
43	Dave Cowens (Florida State)	2.6	4
44	Gary Payton (Oregon State)	2.7	2
45	Ray Allen (Connecticut)	2.6	5
46	Artis Gilmore (Jacksonville)	2.7	1
47	Jameer Nelson (St. Joe's)	3.5	20
48	Bob Lanier (St. Bonaventure)	2.8	1
49	Kawhi Leonard (San Diego State)	3.1	15
50	Bo Kimble (LMU)	2.8	8
51	Jason Kidd (California)	2.5	2
52	Nate Thurmond (Bowling Green)	2.3	3
53	Draymond Green (Michigan State)	2.5	35
54	Glen Rice (Michigan)	3.1	4
55	Ken Sailors (Wyoming)	2.5	100
56	Allen Iverson (Georgetown)	2.3	1
57	Chris Paul (Wake Forest)	3.1	4
58	Kemba Walker (Connecticut)	3.7	9
59	Chris Webber (Michigan)	2.4	1
60	Damian Lillard (Weber State)	3.6	6
61	Zach Edey (Purdue)	4.2	9
62	Walt Hazzard (UCLA)	2.3	1
63	Cooper Flagg (Duke)	2.2	1
64	Austin Carr (Notre Dame)	2.7	1
65	Larry Johnson (UNLV)	3	1
66	John Stockton (Gonzaga)	2.2	16
67	Bernard King (Tennessee)	2.2	7
68	Jimmy Butler (Marquette)	2.4	30
69	Jared Butler (Baylor)	2.7	40
70	Ja Morant (Murray State)	3.8	2
71	Mark Aguirre (DePaul)	2.1	1
72	Johnny Dawkins (Duke)	2.3	10
73	Dominique Wilkins (Georgia)	2.6	3
74	Cazzie Russell (Michigan)	2.6	1
75	Alonzo Mourning (Georgetown)	2.8	2
76	Doug McDermott (Creighton)	3.7	11
77	Steve Nash (Santa Clara)	2.8	15
78	Buddy Hield (Oklahoma)	3.3	6
79	Evan Mobley (USC)	3.2	3
80	Luka Garza (Iowa)	3.9	52
81	Paul Pierce (Kansas)	2.1	10
82	Ben Gordon (Connecticut)	2.9	3
83	Tyler Kolek (Marquette)	3.6	34
84	Walt Frazier (Southern Illinois)	2.4	5
85	Sean May (North Carolina)	3	13
86	Andre Miller (Utah)	3	8
87	Brandon Roy (Washington)	2.9	6
88	Ochai Agbaji (Kansas)	2.8	14
89	Brook Lopez (Stanford)	2.6	10
90	Shane Larkin (Miami)	3	18
91	Ryan Kalkbrenner (Creighton)	3.3	44
92	Sidney Moncrief (Arkansas)	2	5
93	Armen Gilliam (UNLV)	2.6	2
94	Drew Timme (Gonzaga)	3.4	100
95	Bob Kurland (Oklahoma St.)	2.4	40
96	Nigel Williams-Goss (Gonzaga)	2.9	55
97	Greg Oden (Ohio St.)	2.3	1
98	Reggie King (Alabama)	1.8	25
99	Derrick Rose (Memphis)	2	1
100	Charlie Ward (Florida State)	2.4	26

Updated Scoresheet and Value Add Basketball Instructions - UCLA 2018 & Texas 1986 Advance, 12 debut games left

We just updated our Value Add Basketball Game instructions with some new screen shots of key players as well. You can still read the entire instruction this main post for playing the free game, but here is the new beginning of the post. Now that we have the 64 women's teams in place, we also tweaked the scoresheet to show where quarters end.

Our most recent game was a 71-63 win by UCLA 2018 over USC 1994. In that game the double dimes indicate USC star center Lisa Leslie gets the ball on a 5, 7 or 8 while the UCLA star points guard Jordin Canada (20 points and 5 steals in this win) gets the ball on a 1, 6 or 7. UCLA moved up from 43rd to 35th in our updated all-time rankings, while USC dropped from 44th to 54th, but Cheryl Miller's USC team from 11 years earlier is 12th all-time. 

The 2010 Oklahoma team looked strong despite the 66-76 loss vs the first undefeated team - Texas 1986. Texas dropped from 3rd to 4th all-time due to the closer than expected loss, while Oklahoma shot up from 52nd to 45th all-time with the strong showing.

You can print out the scoresheet below in 2 pages, or open this google sheet to score a game. You do need this scoresheet to determine who gets rebounds and for the starting stats for a Value Add Basketball Games since we start players with two points and some other stats and a 20-20 score to keep the play time for the game to 30 to 45 minutes.

Choose the teams you want to play. Click on one of the following links to choose your men's team ...

New List A - Alabama to Connecticut 2004

New List B - Connecticut 2023 to Georgia Tech 2004

New List C- Gonzaga 2017 to Kentucky 1948

New List D- Kentucky 1970 to Miami 1965

New List E - Miami 2013 to North Carolina St. 1974

New List F - Northwestern 2017 to Seton Hall 1989

New List G - Seton Hall 2020 to UCLA 2006

New List H - UCLA 2021 to Yale 2024

... or to choose a woman's team:

We added 11 great women's teams due to more stats becoming available and us finding the coveted Texas 1985-86 stats to make that team (they actually recorded even blocked shots and steals that many did not record until years later).

On this link, Women's Great Teams - Arizona 2021 to Marquette 2019, we added Arizona 2021 (page 1), Auburn 1989 (page 2), Louisiana Tech 1987 (page 19) and LSU 2005 (page 23).

On this link, Women's Great Teams - Maryland 2006 to Stanford 2021, we added Michigan State 2005 (page 2), Notre Dame 2012 (page 8), Oklahoma 2002 (page 12), Old Dominion 1985 (page 15) and Old Dominion 1997 (page 16).

The big two changes were to the third and final - Women's Greats Hoops - Tennessee (8 of greatest 50 ever and we included 3) to Washington 2007Tennessee (8 of greatest 50 ever and we included 3) to Washington 2007 - with perhaps the greatest team ever (Texas 1986) added as well as Tennessee 1989 to give Pat Summit perhaps three of the top seven teams in the game. They are on pages 1 and 4 respectively.

4/24/2024 Note - below the dunk chart used to double check what the DUNK or STOP range are, we have added the new Advanced Jack Gohlke "Dunk Range" Rule.

We track all results - click here for all-time men's results and here for all-time women's results.

College  Basketball Reference references to player cards listed above - Caitlin Clark, Jalen Brunson, Charles Barkley, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, A'ja Wilson, Breanna Stewart, Sue Bird (her UConn teammate Diana Taurasi may have been the greatest pro), Maya Moore, Tamika Catchings, Bill Walton, Wilt Chamberlain, Larry Bird

Here are the games in our new 64 team tournament - but only the 14 games matching teams yet to play in the game. All men's teams have been played in a game.

Team	Yr	Player	Rate	Spread	Opponent	Yr	Result
Arizona	2021	Aari McDonald	-8	-14	Louisiana Tech	1988
Auburn	1989	Carolyn Jones	6	11	Rutgers	1988
Colorado St.	1999	Becky Hammon	-4	-2	Stanford	2012
Indiana	2024	MacKenzie Holmes	-5	-13	Notre Dame	2012
Kentucky	2013	DeNesha Stallworth	-3	3	LSU	2005
Louisiana Tech	1988	Teresa Weatherspoon	6	14	Arizona	2021
Louisville	2009	Angel McCoughtry	-5	-4	Old Dominion	1985
LSU	2005	Sylvia Fowles, Seimone Augustus	-6	-3	Kentucky	2013
Marquette	2019	Chloe Marotta, N Hiedeman	-5	-17	Tennessee	1989
Maryland	2006	Crystal Langhorne	1	2	NC State	2024
Michigan St.	2005	Liz Shimek	0	1	Rutgers	2005
NC State	2024	Aziaha James	-1	-2	Maryland	2006
North Carolina	2007	Ivory Latta	-1	-6	Old Dominion	1997
Notre Dame	2012	Kylar Diggins	8	13	Indiana	2024
Ohio State	1993	Katie Smith	1	3	Vanderbilt	2002
Oklahoma	2010	Abi Olajuwon	-5	-19	Texas	1986	L66-76
Oklahoma	2002	Stacey Dales	-4	0	Texas Tech	1993
Old Dominion	1985	Adrienne Goodson	6	11	Louisville	2009
Old Dominion	1997	Ticha Penicheiro	5	6	North Carolina	2007
Rutgers	1988	Sue Wicks	-5	-11	Auburn	1989
Rutgers	2005	Cappie Poindexter	-1	-1	Michigan St.	2005
Stanford	2012	Nnemkadi Ogwumike	-2	2	Colorado St.	1999
Tennessee	1989	Bridgette Gordon	12	17	Marquette	2019
Texas	1986	Clarissa Davis	14	19	Oklahoma	2010	WW76-66
Texas Tech	1993	Sheryl Swoopes	-4	0	Oklahoma	2002
UCLA	2018	Monique Billings	-3	0	USC	1994	W71-63
USC	1994	Lisa Leslie, Tina Thompson	-3	0	UCLA	2018	L63-71
Vanderbilt	2002	Chantelle Anderson	-2	-3	Ohio State	1993

Deja Vu: Chamberlain Dominates But Russell Wins

The Kansas 1957 star Wilt Chamberlain dominated his rival Bill Russell and 1956 San Francisco, just like he did in most of 94 head-to-head match-ups in the NBA. But like those games, Russell's team dominated 85-64 to surge into the all-time Top 10 basketball teams in our Value Add Basketball Game.

Chamberlain's head-to-head dominance 

All 94 head-to-head matchups are available through Stathead, as Chamberlain more than doubled him 29.9 - 14.2 points head-to-head, 28 - 23 rebounds per game, and we estimate based on foul shots taken drawing more than twice as many fouls per game (8-3). His defense held Russell to only 37% shooting from the floor.

In our game today matching their college teams, the points were not quite as lopsided, but he had a 24 to 18 edge and would have been more lopsided except for an off night from the line, hitting only 8 of 15 free throws. He drew 10 fouls, and had four on Russell by early in the second half when we had to switch defense have Russell guard Ron Loneski the rest of the game, and play softer to try to avoid a foul.

In the game a player can still foul out when you are trying to avoid a foul, but it does not guaranty he will not foul out. The two ways this can be done are:

1. Changing who the player with four fouls is guarding. In this case Chamberlain gets the ball on rolls of 5, 7 and 8 and if he has the ball he draws a foul one-third of the time. A 1-3 is a basket plus foul, and an 8-12 is a foul drawn for two shots. However, Loweski only gets the ball on a roll of 4 - so one-third as often - even though he does draw a foul one-quarter of the time on his card (if there is not a turnover or blocked shot) on a 6-10 roll on the 20-sided dice.

2. The team can also declare the player is playing to avoid the foul which makes an adjustment on his card. The defensive numbers for fouling are 33-36, and if playing soft then all those rolls turn into a 2-point basket uncontested. Normally Russell fouls on a 35-36 but not on a 33-34, but all are changed to a basket when playing soft. We played this game as a neutral site, but if a team is at home they get to flip rolls of 36 and 66 to get an extra couple of calls again against the road team.

Russell's championship, win dominance 

And yes, Chamberlain got little help and despite his dominance, Russell's San Francisco Dons dominated the game 85-64.

While the two never played in college, Russell's teams dominated the NBA match-ups with a 57-37 game record and went 29-20 in playoff head-to-head matchups. This team was the second of back-to-back titles in college, and his Celtics teams then won 11 of 13 NBA titles for an incredible 13 of 15 titles. It was nice to have KC Jones at his side both in college and the pros, and Russell was hurt one season or it might have been 14 of 15.

In our Game Score Tracker and Ratings of the 200 All-Time great teams in our game, San Francisco improves to the 10th best team of all-time. It could certainly be argued this was the greatest team in college basketball history, at least outside of some UCLA teams.

The previous season they lost their second game of the season against UCLA and were not even ranked. They then won the last 25 games of the season to take the title. They returned for the 1956 season depicted by these cards and won every game, and only one team - Marquette which had made their first Elite 8 the year before - came within single digits.

Here is the new top 25, with three teams tied in 25th. San Francisco is 3-1, averaging a 73-63.5 win, with a kenpom.com-like ranking in our game of 9.1, meaning we calculate they would be expected to beat the average other all-time great team by 9.1 points.

 

All-Time	Top 25 of all-time great VABG teams	Pre Rank	Won	Lost	Score	Allow	SoS	Rating
1	UCLA - 1972 - Bill Walton	1	6	0	72	62.0	-0.5	14.7
2	Kansas - 1997 - Paul Pierce	17	5	0	76.8	62.4	-1.0	13.0
3	Duke - 2001 - Shane Battier	4	3	1	78.3	72.5	4.8	12.3
4	Ohio St. - 1960 - Jerry Lucas	6	2	1	84	76.3	4.7	11.8
5	Indiana - 1976 - Scott May	7	3	1	71.3	59.8	-0.8	11.1
6	Houston - 1968 - Elvin Hayes	14	3	1	73	63.8	1.3	10.1
7	North Carolina - 1982 - Michael Jordan	11	5	1	68.8	65	4.0	10.0
8	Kansas - 2008 - Mario Chalmers	47	5	1	74.7	56.0	-0.7	9.8
9	Kentucky - 1996 - Antoine Walker	5	2	1	72	69.3	3.3	9.7
10	San Francisco - 1956 - Bill Russell	25	3	1	73	63.5	1.0	9.1
11	North Carolina - 2005 - Sean May	15	3	2	72.2	64.4	2.0	9.1
12	Arkansas - 1994 - Corliss Williamson	20	1	2	75.3	70.3	8.0	8.2
13	Villanova - 2018 - Mikal Bridges	21	7	2	79.4	70.3	0.1	7.9
14	Connecticut - 2023 - Adama Sanogo	12	2	0	77	39.0	-19.0	7.8
15	Connecticut - 2004 - Ben Gordon	48	5	2	74.7	66.0	0.7	7.5
16	Virginia - 2019 - Kyle Guy	27	4	1	72.6	65.4	2.4	7.4
17	Baylor - 2021 - Jared Butler	49	2	2	86	78.5	4.8	7.4
18	Louisville - 2013 - Russ Smith	28	2	1	74	66.3	1.7	7.3
19	Gonzaga - 2017 - Nigel Williams-Goss	22	3	3	69.8	63.0	3.0	6.8
20	Kentucky - 2012 - Anthony Davis	2	4	2	72.2	65.7	-4.7	6.6
21	Duke - 1992 - Christian Laettner	8	1	2	73.7	70.3	1.0	6.5
22	North Carolina St. - 1974 - David Thompson	16	2	1	72	72.7	4.3	6.5
23	Duke - 2010 - Jon Scheyer	29	5	2	74	66.7	0.1	6.4
24	DePaul - 1980 - Mark Aguirre	119	3	1	76.8	68.8	3.5	6.4
25	Michigan St. - 1979 - Magic Johnson	23	2	1	70.3	62.7	-2.3	5.8
25	Houston - 1983 - Hakeem Olajuwon	24	2	1	70.7	65.0	-0.3	5.8
25	Cincinnati - 1960 - Oscar Robertson	9	1	2	72.3	78.0	8.3	5.8

San Francisco is first of all WCC teams, with only a recent Gonzaga team close. We list the top three in the nine conferences with at least six all-time great teams in the game. We are combining the Mountain West and Pac-12 under the assumption that will be the setup next year. We extended the B12 to show that Kansas actually has four of the top 79 teams of all time.

The first number listed is where they rank of conference teams, and the second number where they rank of all teams.

 

Conf	Over	WCC All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	10	San Francisco - 1956 - Bill Russell	4.3	3	1	73.0	63.5	5	9.1
2	18	Gonzaga - 2017 - Nigel Williams-Goss	6.8	3	3	69.8	63.0	5	3.0
3	51	Loyola Marymount - 1990 - Bo Kimble	1.8	1	2	112.3	108.3	-2	2.3
Conf	Over	B12 All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	2	Kansas - 1997 - Paul Pierce	13.0	5	0	76.8	62.4	7	-1.0
2	6	Houston - 1968 - Elvin Hayes	10.1	3	1	73.0	63.8	8	1.3
3	8	Kansas - 2008 - Mario Chalmers	9.8	5	1	74.7	56.0	2	-0.7
4	16	Baylor - 2021 - Jared Butler	7.4	2	2	86.0	78.5	2	4.8
5	25	Houston - 1983 - Hakeem Olajuwon	5.8	2	1	70.7	65.0	5	-0.3
6	26	Cincinnati - 1960 - Oscar Robertson	5.7	1	2	72.3	78.0	10	8.3
7	46	Houston - 2021 - Quentin Grimes	2.0	1	0	102.0	50.0	0	-16.0
11	69	Kansas - 2022 - Ochai Agbaji	0.5	1	0	87.0	81.0	0	-7.9
15	79	Kansas - 1957 - Wilt Chamberlain	2.7	3	2	67.8	71.4	5	-1.0
Conf	Over	A10 All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	37	Massachusetts - 1996 - Marcus Camby	3.0	0	0	0.0	0.0	3	0.0
2	72	Loyola-Chicago - 1963 - Jerry Harkness	0.0	0	1	62.0	68.0	4	-2.0
3	115	Dayton - 2020 - Obi Toppin	-3.8	1	1	81.5	80.5	-3	-4.0
Conf	Over	ACC All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	3	Duke - 2001 - Shane Battier	12.3	3	1	78.3	72.5	12	4.8
2	7	North Carolina - 1982 - Michael Jordan	10.0	5	1	68.8	65.0	9	4.0
3	10	North Carolina - 2005 - Sean May	9.1	3	2	72.2	64.4	8	2.0
Conf	Over	Amer All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	43	Memphis - 2008 - Derrick Rose	2.4	4	2	68.7	65.8	3	-0.3
2	73	Temple - 1958 - Guy Rodgers	0.0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0	0.0
3	74	Tulsa - 2000 - Eric Coley	0.0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0	0.0
Conf	Over	B10 All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	1	UCLA - 1972 - Bill Walton	14.7	6	0	72.0	62.0	17	-0.5
2	4	Ohio St. - 1960 - Jerry Lucas	11.8	2	1	84.0	76.3	10	4.7
3	5	Indiana - 1976 - Scott May	11.1	3	1	71.3	59.8	10	-0.8
Conf	Over	BE All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	12	Villanova - 2018 - Mikal Bridges	7.9	7	2	79.4	70.3	5	0.1
2	13	Connecticut - 2023 - Adama Sanogo	7.8	2	0	78.5	58.0	10	-11.0
3	14	Connecticut - 2004 - Ben Gordon	7.5	5	2	74.7	66.0	2	0.7
Conf	Over	P12/MWC All-Time Value Add Basketball	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	40	UNLV - 1991 - Larry Johnson	2.8	1	2	72.7	76.3	10	0.7
2	47	Oregon St. - 1982 - AC Green	2.0	0	0	0.0	0.0	2	0.0
3	105	San Diego St. - 2011 - Kawhi Leonard	-2.9	2	2	69.3	71.8	-3	-0.3
Conf	Over	SEC All-Time Value Add Basketball Game	Rating	Won	Lost	Pts	Allow	PreS	SOS
1	9	Kentucky - 1996 - Antoine Walker	9.7	2	1	72.0	69.3	12	3.3
2	11	Arkansas - 1994 - Corliss Williamson	8.2	1	2	75.3	70.3	5	8.0
3	19	Kentucky - 2012 - Anthony Davis	6.6	4	2	72.2	65.7	15	-4.7

And here is the box score from today's Value Add Basketball Game.

 

Pos	Kansas 1957	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl		Actual Season
1-PG	John Parker	7	1	2	0	0	2	1	0	4	6'0	5.5 Pts, 2.0 Reb
2-SG	Maurice King	4	0	2	0	0	4	1	0	2	6'2	9.7 Pts, 4.5 Reb-NBA
3-SF	Gene Elstun	14	0	7	0	0	7	0	0	3	6'3	11.3 Pts, 5.3 Reb
4-PF	Ron Loneski	7	1	2	0	0	6	1	1	2	6'4	9.6 Pts, 6.8 Reb
5-C	Wilt Chamberlain	24	0	8	8	15	10	0	4	3	7'1	29.6 Pts, 18.9 Reb-NBA
1-PG	John Cleland	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	6'3	2.0 Pts, 0.7 Reb
2-SG	Bob Billings	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	5'11	2.2 Pts, 0.9 Reb
3-SF	Larry Kelley	4	0	2	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'0	2.0 Pts, 2.0 Reb
4-PF	Monte Johnson	4	0	2	0	0	3	0	0	1	6'5	1.1 Pts, 1.5 Reb
5-C	Lew Johnson	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'6	3.0 Pts, 3.9 Reb
	Jayhawks Totals	64	2	25	8	15	34	3	5	19		13 turnovers
Pos	San Francisco 1956	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl	Ht	Actual Season
1-PG	Hal Perry	16	0	6	4	5	4	2	0	1	5'10	9.1 Pts, 2.0 Reb
2-SG	Carl Boldt	9	1	2	2	2	7	1	0	1	6'4	8.6 Pts, 5.0 Reb
3-SF	K.C. Jones	15	0	6	3	4	5	0	0	2	6'1	9.8 Pts, 5.2 Reb-NBA
4-PF	Mike Farmer	13	0	6	1	1	7	0	0	5	6'7	8.4 Pts, 7.8 Reb-NBA
5-C	Bill Russell	18	0	8	2	4	11	0	6	4	6'9	20.6 Pts, 21.0 Reb-NBA
1-PG	Harold Payne	2	0	1	0	0	0	1	0	1	5'11	1.0 Pts, 0.1 Reb
2-SG	John Koljian	0	0	0	0	0	2	0	0	1	6'3	1.0 Pts, 1.0 Reb
3-SF	Mike Preaseau	2	0	1	0	0	2	0	0	1	6'5	4.1 Pts, 3.1 Reb
4-PF	Bill Mallen	8	0	4	0	0	3	0	0	1	6'4	4.2 Pts, 3.5 Reb
5-C	Gene Brown	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	1	2	6'3	7.1 Pts, 4.4 Reb
	Dons Totals	85	1	35	12	16	42	4	7	19		10 turnovers

And here is the scoresheet to show the running score.

Chamberlain (25 pts, 9 blks) & Kansas Beats Donovan (8 Stls) & Providence; Russell Next

In a defensive war, Kansas could barely get the ball down the court against Cinderella 1987 Final 4 team Providence, which turned them over 20 times including 8 steals by Billy Donovan in the Value Add Basketball Game. For the account of Bill Russell's 73-60 San Francisco over Vanderbilt win in the other semifinal, click here. Here are the updated all-time rankings of all 200 teams in the game broken down by their 2024-25 conference (regardless of what conference they played in during the year in the game).

We have added a post on the result of the game here.

However, when Providence's normally high powered offense got to the rim they were shut down by Wilt Chamberlain, who had nine of Kansas 12 blocked shots to allow only 19 field goals by Providence in a 69-55 win. Kansas did have one 3-pointer, from John Parker, among their 29 field goals and both teams were almost perfect from the line - 13 of 14 by Providence and 10 of 11 by Kansas - or it could have been a very low scoring game.

Chamberlain advances to face his long-time NBA rival Bill Russell. Both the 1957 Kansas team and the 1956 San Francisco team were added because we had just updated the block range for the four top shot blockers of all time including Russell and Chamberlain (see updated cards of them and  David Robinson and Hakeem Olajuwan here) so wanted to play their new cards. The other teams in this tournament were the last six teams we created when we realized we had missed a couple of schools in trying to have a team created for each school in a power conference.

Kansas moves up to #34 on our all-time list with the win, and will place #26 ranked San Francisco for the title. Providence drops to #66 of our 200 all-time great teams. The overall rankings and scores of all games played to date are on this google link.

 

Pos	Providence 1987	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl	Ht	Summary
1-PG	Billy Donovan	12	1	2	5	6	2	8	0	1	6'0	20.6 Pts, 3.0 Reb, 7.1 Ast-NBA
2-SG	Pop Lewis	9	1	1	4	4	1	4	0	1	6'4	11.8 Pts, 4.2 Reb, 2.6 Ast
3-SF	Delray Brooks	10	2	2	0	0	5	1	0	2	6'4	14.4 Pts, 3.9 Reb, 2.6 Ast
4-PF	Jacek Duda	2	0	1	0	0	2	0	0	1	6'11	3.4 Pts, 3.4 Reb, 0.2 Ast
5-C	Dave Kipfer	6	0	2	2	2	6	1	3	3	6'7	11.7 Pts, 5.3 Reb, 1.0 Ast
1-PG	Carlton Screen	4	0	2	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'0	5.2 Pts, 1.1 Reb, 2.4 Ast
2-SG	Darryl Wright	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	2	6'5	6.1 Pts, 2.2 Reb, 0.9 Ast
3-SF	Marty Conlon	4	0	1	2	2	1	0	0	1	6'10	4.4 Pts, 2.9 Reb, 0.5 Ast-NBA
4-PF	Abdul Shamsid-Deen	4	0	2	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'11	3.5 Pts, 2.5 Reb, 0.0 Ast
5-C	Steve Wright	2	0	1	0	0	5	0	0	3	6'9	7.9 Pts, 4.8 Reb, 0.2 Ast
	13 Turnovers	55	4	15	13	14	25	14	3	16		12 Turnovers
Pos	Kansas 1957	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl		Actual Season
1-PG	John Parker	9	1	2	2	2	3	4	0	3	6'0	5.5 Pts, 2.0 Reb
2-SG	Maurice King	6	0	3	0	0	2	1	0	3	6'2	9.7 Pts, 4.5 Reb-NBA
3-SF	Gene Elstun	17	0	7	3	3	5	0	1	1	6'3	11.3 Pts, 5.3 Reb
4-PF	Ron Loneski	4	0	2	0	0	7	0	2	1	6'4	9.6 Pts, 6.8 Reb
5-C	Wilt Chamberlain	25	0	10	5	6	13	0	9	2	7'1	29.6 Pts, 18.9 Reb-NBA
1-PG	John Cleland	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	2	6'3	2.0 Pts, 0.7 Reb
2-SG	Bob Billings	0	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	1	5'11	2.2 Pts, 0.9 Reb
3-SF	Larry Kelley	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'0	2.0 Pts, 2.0 Reb
4-PF	Monte Johnson	2	0	1	0	0	2	0	0	2	6'5	1.1 Pts, 1.5 Reb
5-C	Lew Johnson	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'6	3.0 Pts, 3.9 Reb
	Jayhawks Totals	69	1	28	10	11	36	6	12	17		20 Turnovers

As the scoresheet below shows, the game was tied 42-42 with 13:50, or 23 possessions left to play, and Providence cut it to 53-49 on a Billy Donovan steal, fast break basket, and free throw after being fouled.

However, Wilt Chamberlain responded with a basket and drew a foul, hitting the free throw to make it 56-49 with 5:49 (10 possessions) to play. Kansas got their one 3-point shot of the day from John Parker with five minutes to play to make it 59-51 and start a 9-0 run to make it 65-51 with 2:07 (4 possessions) to play.