Gonzaga's Kyle Wiltjer leads Top 100 projected scorers in college hoops

SI projections put Gonzaga's Kyle Wiltjer as the top scorer in the country, with Ole Miss's Stefan Moody, Oklahoma's Buddy Hield and Rhode Island's E.C. Mathews also appearing in the top 10.

Over the coming weeks, SI will reveal its player projections, conference forecasts and national rankings for the 2015-16 season. These are derived from our statistical projection system, a collaboration between economist DanHannerand SI's Luke Winn and Chris Johnson that's now in its second year.

We used the projection model to generate individual stats for every player in the top 11 conferences (AAC, ACC, Atlantic 10, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Missouri Valley, Mountain West, Pac-12, SEC and West Coast). The individual projections are based on many factors, including players' past advanced-statistical performance in the context of more than a decade of D-I player data; the predictive power of recruiting ratings, both on immediate freshman performance and longer-term development; coaches' abilities to develop and maximize talent, as well as their playing-time distribution tendencies; teams' estimated pace of play; andintelfrom teams on how their rotations will be structured, which helps us better forecast how many minutes and shots will be available to each player.

The second reveal of SI's projection-system output isour top 100 scorers, by raw points per game:

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
1	Kyle Wiltjer	Gonzaga	21.0	16.8
2	D.J. Balentine	Evansville	20.6	20.1
3	Stefan Moody	Mississippi	19.1	16.6
4	Jared Brownridge	Santa Clara	18.7	15.9
5	Jordan Price	La Salle	18.4	17.2
6	D'Vauntes Smith-Rivera	Georgetown	17.8	16.3
7	Buddy Hield	Oklahoma	17.7	17.4
8	E.C. Matthews	Rhode Island	17.5	16.9
9	Jack Gibbs	Davidson	17.5	16.2
10	DeAndre Bembry	Saint Joseph's	17.4	17.7

On Wednesday, SI named Gonzaga's Kyle Wiltjer (No. 1) a frontrunner for national player of the year, so he needs no additional hype. Evansville's D.J. Balentine (No. 2) on the other hand, might be the best scoring guard you've yet to see on TV: He averaged 27.2 points in Evansville's five CIT games last postseason and has averaged 20-plus points for the past two seasons. Our projections view him as Wiltjer's primary challenger for the national scoring title. Balentine has an outside shot at making his first NCAA tournament appearance this season, too; we project the Aces as the best Missouri Valley Conference team not named Wichita State.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
11	Ben Simmons	LSU	17.2	N/A
12	Marcus Posley	St. Bonaventure	17.1	16.7
13	Shavon Shields	Nebraska	17.0	15.4
14	Chase Fischer	BYU	16.9	13.2
15	Cullen Neal	New Mexico	16.9	17.0
16	Kris Dunn	Providence	16.9	15.6
17	Jaylen Brown	California	16.8	N/A
18	Taurean Prince	Baylor	16.7	13.9
19	Phil Forte	Oklahoma St.	16.7	15.0
20	Georges Niang	Iowa St.	16.6	15.3

After transferring to BYU from Wake Forest, Chase Fischer (No. 14) spent 2014-15 as an auxiliary option to volume scorer Tyler Haws. SI's projections expect Fischer to emerge as one of the country's top scorers as a senior. He's already an accomplished three-point shooter, having ranked 10th nationally in long-range makes last season, and he'll be playing in a fast-paced offense alongside an elite distributor in Kyle Collinsworth (No. 30).

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
21	Anthony Beane Jr.	Southern Illinois	16.6	16.1
22	Marvelle Harris	Fresno St.	16.5	16.4
23	Grayson Allen	Duke	16.4	4.5
24	Denzel Valentine	Michigan St.	16.4	14.5
25	DeVaughn Akoon-Purcell	Illinois St.	16.4	12.3
26	Perry Ellis	Kansas	16.3	13.8
27	Melo Trimble	Maryland	16.3	16.2
28	Codi Miller-McIntyre	Wake Forest	16.2	14.5
29	Yogi Ferrell	Indiana	16.2	16.3
30	Kyle Collinsworth	BYU	16.1	13.8

No one on SI's top 100 scorers list is projected to make a bigger leap than Duke's Grayson Allen (No. 23), who averaged 4.5 points per game as a freshman and could realistically exceed 16 as a sophomore. Meanwhile, our projections expect Illinois State's DeVaughn Akoon-Purcell (No. 25) to emerge as a mid-major scoring star and the leader of a tourney darkhorse.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
31	Nigel Hayes	Wisconsin	15.7	12.4
32	Andrew Andrews	Washington	15.7	15.0
33	James Blackmon Jr.	Indiana	15.7	15.7
34	Brandon Ingram	Duke	15.6
35	Kellen Dunham	Butler	15.6	16.5
36	Anthony Barber	North Carolina St.	15.4	12.1
37	Stacy Davis	Pepperdine	15.4	15.7
38	Bronson Koenig	Wisconsin	15.4	8.7
39	Josh Scott	Colorado	15.3	14.5
40	Louis Dabney	Tulane	15.3	13.6

After two years of being led in scoring by Frank Kaminsky and Sam Dekker, Wisconsin is now Nigel Hayes's (No. 31) and Bronson Koenig's (No. 38) team. SI projects the Badgers' junior-co stars to each average 15-plus points per game. Hayes is already a natural, high-volume scorer, but look for Koenig to evolve from an occasional shooter into UW's primary source of backcourt offense.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
41	Demetrius Jackson	Notre Dame	15.2	12.4
42	Damian Jones	Vanderbilt	15.1	14.4
43	Zach Auguste	Notre Dame	15.0	12.8
44	Sheldon McClellan	Miami (Fla.)	15.0	14.5
45	Josh Hawkinson	Washington St.	15.0	14.7
46	Jalen Reynolds	Xavier	15.0	9.9
47	T.J. Wallace	Pacific	14.8	13.0
48	T.J. Cline	Richmond	14.8	11.8
49	Ron Baker	Wichita St.	14.8	14.7
50	Billy Garrett	DePaul	14.7	12.3

Notre Dame's Demetrius Jackson (No. 41) is ready to make the transition from Jerian Grant's sidekick into one of the nation's best point guards. There are plenty of shots available after the departures of Grant and Pat Connaughton, and Jackson and Zach Auguste (No. 43) project to be an elite point guard/center scoring duo.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
51	Craig Sword	Mississippi St.	14.6	11.3
52	Eli Carter	Boston College	14.6	8.8
53	Dion Wright	St. Bonaventure	14.5	13.5
54	Anthony Drmic	Boise St.	14.5	15.0
55	Caleb White	East Carolina	14.5	12.2
56	Malcolm Brogdon	Virginia	14.4	14.0
57	Jamal Murray	Kentucky	14.4
58	Alec Wintering	Portland	14.3	12.3
59	Warren Jones	Bradley	14.3	11.9
60	V.J. Beachem	Notre Dame	14.3	5.9

You may have forgotten about Boise State's Anthony Drmic (No. 54), a proven scorer who played just seven games in 2014-15 before suffering a season-ending ankle injury. The Australian import was granted a fifth year of eligibility by the NCAA as a medical hardship case and should contend for Mountain West player of the year honors.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
61	Malik Newman	Mississippi St.	14.3
62	Nic Moore	SMU	14.3	14.5
63	Marcus Paige	North Carolina	14.3	14.1
64	Isaiah Taylor	Texas	14.3	13.1
65	James Woodard	Tulsa	14.3	14.5
66	Danuel House	Texas A&M	14.3	14.8
67	Tyrone Wallace	California	14.3	17.0
68	ShawnDre' Jones	Richmond	14.2	10.3
69	Isaiah Whitehead	Seton Hall	14.2	12.0
70	Bryce Alford	UCLA	14.2	15.4

SI projects two members of Mississippi State's backcourt to crack the top 100: senior Craig Sword (No. 51) and freshman Malik Newman (no. 61). There may not be enough talent around them for the Bulldogs to reach the NCAA tournament in coach Ben Howland's first season—our projections view them as an NIT team—but regardless, the Sword-Newman duo will be fun to watch.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
71	Nate Mason	Minnesota	14.2	9.8
72	Duane Wilson	Marquette	14.1	11.9
73	Caris LeVert	Michigan	14.1	14.9
74	Malcolm Hill	Illinois	14.1	14.4
75	Fred VanVleet	Wichita St.	14.0	13.6
76	Brandon Taylor	Penn St.	14.0	9.1
77	Jalen Moore	Utah St.	14.0	15.2
78	Shep Garner	Penn St.	14.0	9.2
79	Myke Henry	DePaul	14.0	12.0
80	B.J. Tyson	East Carolina	14.0	12.6

Getting Caris LeVert (No. 73) back for his senior season—after a foot fracture cut his junior campaign to just 17 games—is a boon for Michigan. SI's projections have the versatile guard putting up 14.1 points per game, but that could be conservative if wing Zak Irvin is slow to recover from a back injury that's sidelined him in the preseason.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
81	AJ West	Nevada	13.9	12.1
82	Jarrod Uthoff	Iowa	13.9	12.4
83	Mandell Thomas	Fordham	13.8	13.3
84	Micah Mason	Duquesne	13.8	12.8
85	Skal Labissiere	Kentucky	13.8
86	Terry Allen	Richmond	13.8	13.0
87	Brice Johnson	North Carolina	13.8	12.9
88	Shevon Thompson	George Mason	13.7	12.5
89	Katin Reinhardt	USC	13.7	12.5
90	Brian Sullivan	Davidson	13.7	12.7

Kentucky, just as it did last season, projects to have a ultra-balanced scoring attack. SI expects freshmen Skal Labissiere (No. 85) and Jamal Murray (No. 57) to be the co-leaders in what will likely be their only season in Lexington. Both are projected Lottery Picks in the 2016 NBA Draft.

Rank	Name	Team	Projected PPG	Last year’s PPG
91	Elgin Cook	Oregon	13.6	13.0
92	Josh Adams	Wyoming	13.6	12.8
93	Melvin Johnson	VCU	13.6	12.3
94	Henry Ellenson	Marquette	13.6
95	Dillon Brooks	Oregon	13.5	11.5
96	Mike Young	Pittsburgh	13.5	13.4
97	Monte Morris	Iowa St.	13.4	11.9
98	Justin Jackson	North Carolina	13.4	10.7
99	Xavier Rathan-Mayes	Florida St.	13.4	14.9
100	Steve Vasturia	Notre Dame	13.4	10.1

The prize of Marquette's 2015 recruiting class, stretch-four Henry Ellenson (No. 94), projects to be the highest-scoring freshman in the Big East. He and sophomore guard Duane Wilson (No. 72) will lead a Golden Eagles team that we expect to get back to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2013.