When looking at improvement from year-to-year in a basketball sense, a coach would be happy to see one of his players get 40-50% better each season.
How would a coach feel about one of his players improving by 681% then? That's exactly what Spencer Parker did.
Parker's freshman season was a pretty normal one for a new player just getting used to the college game. He only averaged six minutes, one and a half points and one rebound per game. To be fair to Parker, he was playing behind A'uston Calhoun, Bowling Green's best player who played 35 minutes per game.
But when Calhoun graduated, it was Parker's time to step up. And, oh did he ever.
Parker posted career highs in every category during his sophomore season and ended up with a fantastic stat-line for the season: averages of 12.5 points and five rebounds all while playing 35 minutes per game. It's almost unheard of for a player to go from averaging five minutes per game in one season to 35 the next. Parker didn't score in double digits at all during his freshman season but did it 24 times last year.
The question for this season is whether Parker can keep it up. He'll certainly be a starter at the power forward spot and should benefit from new head coach Chris Jans' up-tempo style. He's a mismatch on offense, and while he's not a threat to hit threes (just 9-53 last year) he knows how to get to the free throw line. Parker led the Falcons in free throw attempts last year and was pretty solid hitting 70% of them.
For Parker to be successful again this season he'll need to just do what he did last year: get to the free throw line and rebound well. It's not realistic to think that Parker will show as much improvement as he did from his freshman-to-sophomore season. But, if Jans can get seventeen points and seven rebounds per game out of him this season he'll be more than happy.