Defending national player of the year Oscar Tshiebwe is not the odds-on favorite to win this season as of right now (roughly a third of the way through the season).
According to Caesar’s Sportsbook, Purdue’s Zach Edey is the current heavy favorite with 1-2 odds. Tshiebwe and Kansas’ Jalen Wilson are second with 10-1 odds.
Edey is averaging 22.6 points, 13.9 rebounds and 2.2 blocks in 31.8 minutes per game this season. Tshiebwe is putting up 15.0 points, 13.0 rebounds and 1.6 blocked shots per game.
Here’s an excerpt from the Lexington Herald-Leader:
OSCAR TSHIEBWE, KENTUCKY Caesars odds: 10-1.
Tshiebwe is still playing at an extraordinarily high level, even if his team’s results (so far) haven’t lived up to the preseason hype. The Kentucky big man is averaging 15.0 points and 13.0 rebounds per game. He leads the Wildcats in blocked shots at 1.6 per game, and he’s doing it all on a knee that is still rounding back into shape following that late-preseason surgery. John Calipari also limited his minutes against South Carolina State, something that obviously had a negative impact on his per-game stats. Throw out that game (and his eight-rebound performance against Florida A&M last week), and Tshiebwe has grabbed at least 12 rebounds every time he’s stepped on the court. And he’s continued to dominate that stat against big-time opponents: Michigan State (18 rebounds), UCLA (16), Gonzaga (15) and Michigan (14). He made clear over the summer that he wasn’t focused on repeating as the nation’s top player — saying he didn’t have room for any more trophies anyway, after last season’s haul — but he’s still got a shot to pull off that feat. No player has repeated as the consensus national player of the year since Ralph Sampson did it in 1983.
Other players on the top tier of betting favorites are Indiana’s Trayce Jackson-Davis and Gonzaga big man Drew Timme.
