Xavier has 13 new players on their roster this season and out of all of them, Tre Carroll has come the closest to living every college basketball player’s dream and winning the National Championship. As
a freshman, he was a part of the Florida Atlantic team that shocked squeaked past Memphis, dispatched Farleigh Dickinson, and then upset Tennessee and K State on their way to a Final Four berth that was one Lamont Butler buzzer beater away from getting them to the biggest stage in the sport. Carroll only played in 18 games that season, totalling 102 minutes as a redshirt freshman, and jumped up to playing in 24 contests and totalling 187 minutes as a sophomore. With the core of the Final Four team moving on, last season was Carroll’s breakout as he averaged 12.2/5.2/1.6 and was named Second Team All-AAC as well as AAC Co-Most Improved Player. If his first two seasons he was a somewhat easy to miss cog in a rotation of star players, last season he was impossible to miss. Carroll plays the game with flair and intensity with his hair flowing and whipping every which way as he seeks to outwork and outthink his opposition. While his competitive fire is indisputable, it speaks to the level of fun and joy he brings to the table that he was also named the first ever recipient of the AAC’s Amir Abdur-Rahim Sportsmanship Award as selected by the league’s coaches.
Carroll stands only 6’7”, but profiles as a forward and takes his shots in roughly the same spots as Jerome Hunter. He does a lot of his work around the rim, but is also comfortable working in the midrange and is confident when he steps out to take a 3. He also excels on the offensive glass where his dynamism and toughness make him a handful for opposing frontcourts. Two major differences between him and Hunter are the conversion rate on two point jumpers, where Carrolls is 18% higher, and distribution on offense, which is a much bigger part of Carroll’s game. Even when he was not playing a lot of minutes at FAU, Carroll has always been a high usage rate player, never dropping below 25.2% in his career, so it won’t be surprising given his experience and skill set if he is one of Xavier’s primary options on offense this season. Defensively, he blocks shots well and is active on the glass and has managed to remain effective while curtailing the foul rate problems that he had early in his career.
Carroll is a guy who can do a lot of things on a basketball court and probably will be near the top of Xavier’s rotation this season due to that versatility. With there being a lot of unknowns for Xavier this year in terms of playing time and roles, one of the things that seems most certain about this season is that Tre Carroll is going to leave it all out there and do his best to make this team fun to watch.
