and now it is time to reckon with the final season of the #2 scorer in program history
With the 2024-25 season long since in the books, let’s take a few moments to look back at the performance of each member of YOUR Marquette Golden Eagles this year. While we’re at it, we’ll also take a look back at our player previews and see how our preseason prognostications stack up with how things actually played out. We’ll run through the roster in order of total minutes played going from lowest to highest, and today we’ll move along to the final entry in our series and finish with a salute to the #2 scorer in Marquette men’s basketball history………
Kam Jones
Senior — #1 — Guard — 6’5” — 205 lbs. — Memphis, Tennessee
*- notes a top 425 national rank per KenPom.com
**- notes a top 300 national rank per KenPom.com
***- notes a top 80 national rank per KenPom.com
****- notes a #12 national rank per KenPom.com
WHAT WE SAID:
Reasonable Expectations
And so, we have to figure out what we should reasonably expect to see from Jones this year. I’ve got a lot of crazy ideas — and we will get to them in the next section — but this is the portion of the show where we stay cool, calm, and rational. We have to remember that while he’s been the leading scorer for the past two years, it’s hard to say that Jones was ever the focal point of opposing defenses. Disrupting the two-man game of Tyler Kolek and Oso Ighodaro was probably high on everyone’s list, and that ultimately did leave Jones a little bit more space to work with on the court. Now everyone’s going to be gunning for him as the primary option, so it feels dishonest to think that he’s going to find a way to truly grow as a scorer as he did from sophomore year to junior year.
I think the reasonable thing to do here is to expect more of the same from Jones. Last year, he averaged 17.2 points, 2.9 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and a bit over a steal per game. He did that while posting a career best field goal percentage of 50.1%, which was powered by shooting better than 40% from behind the arc and nearly 60% inside of it. If I had to guess, I would say that it’s going to be harder for Jones to get the same kind of shot quality this season, so perhaps the numbers stay level as he takes a few more shots but connects a little less often.
Marquette is going to need to fill the Kolek/Ighodaro void, but I think that’s going to mostly have to come from other places on the roster. Expecting Kam Jones to make A Leap from where he was last season seems like a bad choice. Believing he could do it is fine, but expecting it isn’t the right move.
Look no further than the BartTorvik.com algorithmic prediction for proof of that: 18.0 points, 3.8 rebounds, 3.1 assists. That’s not much different than last year.
Why You Should Get Excited
I can’t stop thinking about what Kam Jones did at the open scrimmage in early October.
His three-point shot wasn’t really working for him as he went 1-for-5, but that means he was 5-for-8 inside of the arc. Smart and effective use of his shots, but ultimately, that’s what we expect from not just Jones but from a senior in Shaka Smart’s system. Jones ended up with 15 points, which was going to lead the Gold team in scoring before Josh Clark ran wild with dunks in the final few minutes, and he added a team high five rebounds. Very good stuff, but again, that’s what you expect from a senior leader.
It’s the 11 assists that I keep staring at over and over again. The Gold team scored 24 field goals. Six of those were from Jones himself, so that means there 18 other buckets. Jones had the helper on ELEVEN OF EIGHTEEN field goals.
61%.
I want to be 100% clear about this: No one in the country is putting up an assist rate of 61%. Virginia’s Reece Beekman led the nation last year at 44.8% according to KenPom.com. Tyler Kolek led the country in assists per game last year and was 4th in rate at 41.1%. 61% for an entire season is just not going to happen.
But it does show a desire by Jones to take up a role that has been left empty by Tyler Kolek ending up with the New York Knicks. It shows a recognition by Jones that this year’s version of Marquette needs something from him that last year’s team did not.
What if we don’t get a better Kam Jones, but instead, we get a different Kam Jones?
What if Kam Jones is capable of being one of the best distributing guards in the country? What is he capable of when he gets to play with Stevie Mitchell and David Joplin, two guys who were on the other team in the scrimmage?
I legitimately mean this: What, exactly, is the ceiling for Kam Jones in 2024-25? Maybe the question should actually be is there a ceiling for Jones at all?
Potential Pitfalls
What’s the worst case scenario for Kam Jones this season, with the caveat that I’m talking about a world where he starts in every single one of Marquette’s games? What, he just runs back 17 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists and a steal while shooting 40% from long range? A drop off back to Sophomore Year Kam: 15/4/2, a steal, and only 36% from the arc?
Honestly, as long as Marquette turns in an NCAA tournament worthy season, is anyone going to complain that Jones isn’t blowing the roof off of Fiserv Forum on a nightly basis? I’d rather watch a successful MU season with a middle of the road Kam Jones than a fireballing Kam Jones on a struggling Golden Eagles team….. mostly because I know what the second thing looks like, and I didn’t really like it all that much.
19.6 points, 4.6 rebounds, 6.4 assists, 1.6 steals. Shooting splits of 64% from the field, 44% from behind the three-point line, 70% from the free throw line. That’s national player of the year stuff. That’s what we saw from Kam Jones this season.
…… in November.
The rest of the year as Marquette went 15-11 the rest of the way?
19.1 points, 4.4 rebounds, 5.7 assists, 1.3 steals, which is honestly just barely below that start to the year. However, he had shooting splits of (here it comes, brace yourself) 45% from the field, 29% from behind the three-point line, and 63% from the free throw line.
The warning light on Jones’ shot turned on in Game #9, the Iowa State game, the first game of the month of December. 6-for-21 from the field, including 5-for-16 on twos. His three-point shot officially abandoned him after the December 14th loss at Dayton, as he would have a decent long range night just eight more times the rest of the season. Part of this was an at-the-time undisclosed wrist injury, and I don’t know if you know this, but wrists are pretty important when it comes to shooting the ball.
It’s hard to stare at, I know. But we have to hold the two things in our head at the same time: The points and so on remained strong enough to earn Jones consensus All-American status, including First Team honors from the Wooden Award people……. and Kam Jones having to fight his shooting ability to get to 19 points a night for three straight months put a lid on what Marquette was truly capable of as a ceiling in 2024-25.
You can easily argue that Jones dragged Marquette into the NCAA tournament if you want. Part of the point here is that Jones had to take those shots because there wasn’t anyone else that was coming close to hitting shots well enough for the Golden Eagles. Go back and read the previous Player Reviews. There’s a lot of “yeah, well, but” that I had to write about people’s seasons. A whole lot of meeting expectations, not very much exceeding expectations, or at the very least not massively exceeding them. If no one’s leaping forward to grab the mantle, then Kam’s gonna have to do it for Marquette, and that’s what happened.
But the flip side is still true: From December 1st onwards, we didn’t see the kind of Kam Jones shooting that we came accustomed to seeing, and because of that, Marquette’s team results suffered. If he shoots 39% like he did as a freshman or 41% like his junior year, Marquette’s a hell of a ball club. If he shoots 36% like he did as a sophomore, I’d be willing to wager that Marquette sneaks out an extra win or two or three. Maybe not much, not a huge tip of the season…. but the difference between 36% during the 2022-23 season and the 26.4% in MU’s 20 Big East regular season games is A LOT, especially on six attempts per game.
The really bad part about it? Jones actually started shooting more threes as the season went along. That November line? Just 4.2 attempts from behind the arc per game. He was just over 6.0 in each of the next three months, and in Marquette’s six games in the month of March, Jones fired off 8.2 threes per game…… and made just 26.5 % of them.
He earned the right to take the shots. He was the guy on the roster who should be taking the shots. I can’t deny that part of it. But with no one else turning into a reliable (or willing?) threat, Jones had to start doing a little bit more than maybe he should have been doing. It just didn’t work.
BEST GAME
I mean, duh, it’s the triple-double against Purdue. FUN FACT: Even at 17/13/10 and two steals, Kam Jones was neither 1) Marquette’s leading scorer nor 2) the KenPom.com MVP for this game. It’s still only the third triple-double in program history, and that’s enough to get the spot here.
SEASON GRADE
Kam Jones was an All-American in 2024-25. He beat the computer’s expectation for what he could do. He showed that he could be a distributing guard and fill the void left behind by Tyler Kolek, and honestly, part of the “he needed more help” conversation might have actually limited his 5.9 assists per game or his 12th best in the country assist rate. If he was getting help on the offensive end, if guys were hitting shots when he threw them the ball, Jones’ assists numbers go up and make him look even better than the #9 player in the country in the KenPom.com Player of the Year rankings, which is where he ended up.
I can’t go full blown “hell yeah, that ruled.” Obviously. But I can’t stop thinking about the fact that Marquette needed what they got from Kam Jones — minus the shooting woes — and he delivered in a tremendous way, particularly in the maturity and leadership departments, too. If I go too low here, I’m discounting what he did accomplish on an individual level.
I’m landing on a 9. I welcome a healthy debate in the comments section on whether or not you agree with me.
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