Missing in Main Action: Big Ben Failed to Ring in National Postseason Play
Naturally, it would be unfair to include "one-and-done" players from last season as coronavirus prevented them from participating in national postseason competition. But you can go back to Big Ben to assess whether he a freshman phenom or flop. Five seasons ago, LSU's Ben Simmons was the first NCAA consensus All-American in 38 years (since Minnesota's Mychal Thompson and Portland State's Freeman Williams in 1978) to leave college after failing to appear in either of the two principal national postseason tournaments during their career. After previously occurring frequently, Army's Kevin Houston (1987) had been the last All-American of any type to miss the NCAA tourney and NIT. Houston, Thompson and Williams comprise three of 23 four-year players among all A-As in this dubious category. Thompson is among a total of 50 such players from Big Ten Conference members.
Simmons plus fellow All-Americans Kay Felder (Oakland) and Markelle Fultz (Washington freshman two years ago) might have made bigger names for themselves in college if they had participated in national postseason competition prior to declaring early for the NBA draft. Fultz, briefly a teammate of Simmons with the Philadelphia 76ers, became the 126th standout from a member of an existing power league (26 of them consensus) on the following alphabetical list of All-Americans, including Kevin Love's father (Stan Love/Oregon A-A in 1971), who never competed in the NCAA playoffs or NIT since the national-tourney events were introduced in the late 1930s:
*Number of times named an NCAA consensus All-American.