The Virginia Tech Hokies Buzzketball Review Preview: Ahmed Hill

The first season of the Buzz Williams experience is over, and now's a time not just to look back at Virginia Tech basketball, but look forward at what's to come. To do this, Brian and Pierson have decided not to write a single extensive review on Buzzketball. Instead, they'll examine the past and future by looking at the individuals that make it up. This week they cover the human roller coaster himself, Ahmed Hill.

Brian: In our conversation about Justin Bibbs, it was fairly obvious that your expectations were higher than mine. By the end, I was just trying to pull you down into my personal abyss of negativity and damnation.

Let's just say the roles will be reversed for Hill.

He's athletic, the team's best defender and is often a one man fast break. Now, do those one-on-(insert any number between one and five) transition plays always work out? No. Do they often times end up with the ball flying off a part of the backboard not intended for any legitimate use? Yes.

In fact, do I hold my breathe every time he dribbles more than twice? Absolutely. But say it with me, Booher:

THREE AND D! THREE AND D! THREE AND D!

Pierson: Brian, you know me so well.

I really like what Ahmed Hill brings to this team, and regardless of how he develops over the remainder of his college career, we should all rest easy knowing that he fills a role few can. He is the consummate "Buzz Guy," bringing an incredible amount of energy during his time on the floor while sacrificing himself for the good of the team.

As the season went on, I loved seeing him sag into the corner and jack a three with confidence. An ear-to-ear smile would creep across my face every time he grabbed a long rebound and immediately turned up court like a banshee, unfazed by the numerical disadvantage he faced as he took off from inside the free throw line and picked up a charge. He showed an unwavering tenacity while defending. I loved it.

Maybe it was his Steady Eddie performance night-in and night-out. Maybe it was the fact that, despite a number of notable performances, he never really took over a game (his highest scoring games were ones where you looked down at the stat sheet post-game and realized, "Holy s*$%! Ahmed had himself a game! Who knew?!"). Maybe it's the fact that, at this point, he does a number of things well, but nothing would be considered elite. At least not right now.

That shouldn't be taken as a knock on him. I really like his upside and think he will be a consistent contributor on this team for years to come. Where I hesitate is his ceiling. Is he going to become a well-rounded wing player that gives you 14 points, 6 boards and 3 assists every night? Is he a Tony Allen clone, who is a defensive stalwart but talented enough to provide an offensive spark when needed? Or will he eventually be passed over by someone who happens to do at least one thing at an elite level, relegating him to more of a rotation role?

Brian: There are many things keeping Hill from being passed on the roster by younger players with at least one skills that is theoretically elite.

(Sidebar: I like to call being continuously passed on the basketball depth chart by younger players the "Manny Atkins zone".)

The first and most obvious one is that he is the portrait of hustle. I must have used 60 anecdotes about the effort Hill shows on a game-to-game basis, and while that may not seem like much, think about the state of college basketball today. Constant, balls-to-the-wall effort is enough to keep you in the starting lineup of almost any college basketball team in the country. Well, unless it's Kentucky, who recruits MonStars and humans who grow extra limbs like octopi.

My admiration for Ahmed goes beyond his hustle, however, and it's why I think his potential is overlooked.

For starters, he showed a crucial ability to improve and adapt. This is a very easy measuring stick to use on college athletes. Even the best of the best suffer growing pains, and no matter the measurables or Rivals' stars, the better half of those players always rise to the top.

Watching Hill improve was like watching an old-school flip book in slow motion. On game one he was a reckless freshman driving to the hoop with no regard for human life. By December he was much more skillful at spacing the floor, jacking ill advised triples as opposed to attacking a wall of defenders at the rim.

But once ACC play started, those threes started moving closer and closer to the corner (not only one of the most efficient shooting areas on the court, but a vital spot in order to keep defenses honest). And while I don't have the exact data on this, it seemed that his threes came almost exclusively from the corner by February. Not so coincidentally, he hit 43 percent of his attempts from long distance between then and the end of the year.

To me, that shows someone who was not only working on his game, but learning and adjusting accordingly. That's what professional players are supposed to do. College kids? It's less than a 50/50 proposition that they'll both learn AND adjust.

Also, history is on his side. Let's look at the three most prominent Buzz Williams NBA proteges, Wesley Matthews, Jae Crowder and Jimmy Butler.

All three of those guys have something very similar in common with Hill. They came into school with holes in their game, and yet through the beauty of hard work (and good coaching) they've all turned in pro careers that have risen above expectations.

Matthews never shot threes at a stunning pace in college, but the percentages rose annually. By the time he got to Portland (after a year in Utah) he was the sweet shooting, resident badass of the Trailblazers, due for a huge payday before an Achilles injury in March.

Crowder was an undersized, under recruited power forward that Buzz found in Texas junior college. He didn't have a choice but to work hard, and evolved from a 6'5" post man into the 2011-12 Big East Player of the Year.

While that's a great story, those kind of guys normally don't even sniff the pros, right? Well, Crowder has stuck in the league for his entire rookie contract, and is now a candidate for a nice payday as Boston's energy rebounder and resident tough guy.

And Butler? Oh, you know, he's just an all-star and quite probably the best player on the Bulls. Oh, and he's Chicago's toughest guy too.

Did you notice something there? Not only did those three players over perform by outworking the competition, all three of them are also the toughest members of their respective teams. That's part them, and part their college coach.

If history is any indication, Ahmed Hill may have the best NBA career of any player on this roster. He's the kind of guy who Buzz pushes higher than anyone expects, and I really can't wait to see if he adds anything to his game between now and November.

Pierson: After reading that, my immediate reaction can be summed up as follows:

We're on our third article of this series and I'm already getting a bit wary of over-using the dreaded "P" word: ...No, not that word...get your mind out of the gutter...Potential. I suppose it's the nature of the beast.

As we've said about those who preceded Hill in this series (and will almost assuredly say about those that follow) is that he has shown us glimpses of what he can eventually become in different areas of the game.

With virtually all college freshmen, there are a lot of areas that need improvement. Among others, Hill needs to learn how to attack the rim without picking up an offensive foul; he needs to work on his ball handling; he needs to recognize when to take on three defenders and when to reset; and he needs to improve his pull-up game. Yet while Hill — as currently constituted — is a jack of all trades and master of none, he has a much shorter path than his peers to become a dangerously well-rounded player.

The key questions are (1) which areas of his game continue to develop, and (2) can he eventually put it all together?

When it comes to Hill, I really think you hit the nail on the head. What makes him so intriguing as a basketball player is how unassuming he is. It's a common thread with the three Buzz guys you noted above. Neither Matthews, Crowder, nor Butler exhibits a panache that makes them jump off the screen. No matter how talented they are, you're probably not going to pick them as part of your NBA 2K streetball team.

After only one season, projecting (shiver) Ahmed Hill's tenure at Tech has more to do with what you see from his on-court play and less to do with his stats. Despite playing the third most minutes on the team, Hill did not lead the Hokies in a single statistical category or advanced metric.

But watch him play one game live, and you begin to understand that his greatest attributes are those you cannot teach or find in a box score. The intangibles he possesses are what set him apart from the field and what will ultimately propel him forward in his career. Hill's make-up may not be the sexiest, but he is exactly the type of guy you want when you're building a program from the ground-up.

Brian: Knew you'd come around, but you're wrong on one count. He leads the team in scowls towards opposing players and is the most likely to end up in a feud with another ACC tough guy. I'm pretty sure that's in the advanced metrics box score somewhere.