San Diego State basketball has been one of the best programs in the country for the past five years, and hope to make the second weekend for the third straight season.
The tradition continues! CBB Review is again ranking the top 100 teams heading into the new college basketball season. Each day, we will reveal the next team until we reach the team slotted at number one. Up next: San Diego State basketball.
Since the 2019-2020 season, there has been very few programs better than the San Diego State basketball program. They’ve won the conference regular season three times, won 30+ games twice, and made it all the way to the national championship game two seasons ago. Last year was a “down year”, where they finished 5th in the conference, the lowest since Dutcher took over. Even then, they still made the Sweet 16 before losing to the eventual champs UConn for the second straight year.
This team was led by Jaedon LeDee, who seemingly came out of nowhere and averaged over 20 points a game and became one of the best players in college basketball. He’s gone, and so is pretty much every other rotational player from last season. Reese Waters and Myles Byrd are the only players who averaged more than 10 minutes a game that are returning. That’s just two of eight.
They do bring in several impact transfers. Three of the four transfers are expected to start, and the fourth should be one of the first off the bench. Nick Boyd was on the other side of the miraculous final-four buzzer-beater made by SDSU, so he’s hoping to get a taste of a deep tournament run again. This team also has high hopes for Jared Coleman-Jones, who is coming off a solid season with Middle Tennessee.
San Diego State basketball faces an interesting non-conference schedule, competing in the new Player’s Era Festival. They’ll face three quality programs in Creighton, Oregon, and Texas A&M. How they perform in this tournament should be an indicator of how this team will do this season.
From a talent standpoint, this team is definitely not on the same level as teams of the past. However, Dutcher’s system sets his team up for success, so expect San Diego State basketball to compete for yet another Mountain West Title.
Click here to learn more about our preseason top 100 teams heading into the 2024-25 college basketball season.
Head coach:Â Brian Dutcher (8th season overall, all at San Diego State)
2023-24 record:Â 26-11 (11-7)
2024 postseason finish:Â Lost to UConn (82-52) in Sweet Sixteen of NCAA Tournament
Notable departures:Â
- Jaedon LeDee (21.4 PPG, 8.4 RPG, 1.3 APG)
- Lamont Butler Jr. (9.3 PPG, 3.0 APG, 2.6 RPG)
- Micah Parrish (9.3 PPG, 4.1 RPG, 1.9 APG)
- Darrion Trammell (7.8 PPG, 3.2 APG, 2.5 RPG)
- Elijah Saunders (6.2 PPG, 3.6 RPG, 0.8 APG)
- Jay Pal (5.1 PPG, 4.2 RPG, 0.8 APG)
Notable non-conference games:Â
- vs. Creighton (Nov. 26)
- vs. Oregon (Nov. 27)
- vs. Texas A&M (Nov. 30)
- vs. Cal (Dec. 21)
Projected Rotation
PG: Wayne McKinney III (6-0, 198, Sr.)
2023-24 stats: 13.5 PPG, 3.6 RPG, 2.9 APG, 1.3 SPG, 41.9 FG%, 74.4 FT% (San Diego)
SG: Nick Boyd (6-3, 175, Sr.)
2023-24 stats: 9.3 PPG, 2.7 RPG, 1.8 APG, 40.0 FG%, 84.2 FT% (FAU)
SF: Reese Waters (6-6, 207, Sr.)
2023-24 stats: 9.6 PPG, 3.7 RPG, 1.2 APG, 40.1 FG%, 90.1 FT%
PF: Jared Coleman-Jones (6-10, 235, Sr.)
2023-24 stats: 11.0 PPG, 7.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 1.1 BPG, 45.2 FG%, 44.2 3P% (Middle Tennessee)
C: Miles Heide (6-10, 233, So.)
2023-24 stats: 1.9 PPG, 2.2 RPG, 0.1 APG, 63.3 FG%
6: Kimo Ferrari (6-0, 178, Sr.)
2023-24 stats: 6.7 PPG, 2.5 RPG, 2.0 APG, 1.1 SPG, 46.5 FG%, 44.8 3P% (Brown)
7: Miles Byrd (6-7, 190, So.)
2023-24 stats: 4.0 PPG, 2.5 RPG, 0.9 APG, 84.6 FT%
8: Demarshay Johnson Jr. (6-10, 222, Jr.)
2023-24 stats: 0.4 PPG, 0.9 RPG, 0.1 APG, 4.8 MPG
9: BJ Davis (6-2, 175, So.)
2023-24 stats: 1.2 PPG, 0.4 RPG, 0.1 APG, 77.8 FT%, 5.4 MPG
10: Magoon Gwath (7-0, 205, Rs.-Fr.)
247Sports Composite unranked recruit
San Diego State Basketball team MVP: Reese Waters
If anyone has the chance to take that LeDee jump, it’s Waters. Waters was a borderline top-100 recruit and hasn’t gotten the proper minutes to really show off his skills the past four years. Now, he’ll be an everyday starter and most likely the first option, and he has the chance to shine.
Waters seems to step up against the best. Against BYU, he scored 15 points. He followed that up with 19 points against Saint Mary’s two games later. Right before the new year, he scored 22 against Gonzaga to give the team the win. After that, he saw his minutes start to drop, and as a result, the team wasn’t able to reach its full potential.
At 6-6, he’s a tall guard. Defensively, he’s fine, but Dutcher does a good job making sure he’s not a liability. The keys are his, it’s up to him to lead the team.
San Diego State Basketball make-or-break player: Nicholas Boyd
As we mentioned earlier, Boyd was on the other side of that incredible final-four game between FAU and SDSU, so Boyd becoming an Aztec is a fun twist. Boyd was a starter on that Final 4 team, then took a bench role last year. Surprisingly, his points per game actually went up, and his minutes per game remained the same at 23.9. That number should balloon to around 30, so if he can score 9.3 a game in 24 minutes, they can expect good things with the increased minutes.
The key for Boyd is to improve his three-point shooting to match what we saw in his first two years of college. He shot exactly 40% in both seasons, but last year dipped to 34.1%. His free throw shooting did go from 62.2% to 84.2%, though. If he can maintain that free throw percentage while getting the three-point percentage back up, he’ll be a very dangerous player in the Mountain West.
Key analytic: Defensive Efficiency
In the past five seasons, only three teams have finished top 25 in KenPom defensive efficiency every year, Kansas, Houston, and San Diego State. That’s the San Diego State way. They’re going to defend until the final whistle, and more often than not, it’s going to win them the game.
None of the projected starters were great defenders last year, and most of the bench doesn’t have enough game experience to get an idea of their performance. With a whole summer of learning the defense, expect this team to be in the Top 25 once again.
San Diego State Basketball 2024-25 projections
Projected conference finish: 1st in the Mountain West
Projected postseason ceiling: NCAA Tournament Sweet 16 Exit