There were a lot of questions coming into the 2015-2016 season about how TCU basketball would replace its star point guard, Kyan Anderson.
Those questions were justifiable. Anderson had led the offense for over three seasons, racking up 118 straight starts. He ranked second in TCU basketball history in minutes and games played and led the team in scoring for three straight seasons.
While the season hasn’t gone the way head coach Trent Johnson has hoped, it looks like he has found his point guard of the present and future in Chauncey Collins.
After playing about nine minutes per game his freshman season, Collins has taken the reins and now leads the team in minutes played. He averages 29.8 minutes a game and has played over 100 minutes more than any of his teammates.
Johnson, who spoke with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, said he has seen significant changes in Collins over the past year.
“He had so much going on last year in terms of his lack of commitment to practice, and he had some stuff going on school-wise, he just wasn’t right,” Johnson said. “He’s gotten better every year. He’s a lot different player, a lot different person than he was last year.”
Johnson said Collins has earned his trust this season, and that has turned into production on the court.
The sophomore point guard leads the team in scoring at 11.9 points per game. Collins is also shooting 41 percent on 3-pointers, which is good for seventh in the Big 12.
The Oklahoma-native is familiar with success. Collins was a highly-touted player for his homeschool prep team, the Oklahoma City Storm.
Collins led the Storm to claim two national championships during his high school career. During his senior year, he averaged 28.3 points per game and was named the Homeschool National Player of the Year for the second straight season.
The success has translated on a personal level for Collins during his sophomore year of college. He said he just hopes that it will turn into success for the team as a whole.
After scoring a career-high 29 points in a loss to Texas Tech, Collins said he thinks the team is getting closer to where they want to be.
“We’re getting there,” Collins said. “I feel like we’ve got a big up. We just got to keep buying into coach [Johnson], what he has to say; because everything he says works.”
That kind of attitude is what Johnson wants Collins to bring every day as a leader of the team. If that can be established as the culture of TCU basketball, success will eventually follow.
