...just look at the difference between player's individual seasons and their overall team contribution/productivity with the 2018-19 team vs the 2019-20 team. We had returning guys from that '18-'19 team like TJ, Yo, Zac, Dalton Nixon, Connor Harding and Kolby Lee that won 19 games. Yo was an All-WCC 1st teamer already, TJ was a 2nd teamer but the remaining guys like Nixon (3.5 pts, 2.6 rebs .063% from 3), Seljaas (7.1 pts, 3.5 rebs, 37.3% from 3), Connor (6.2 pts, 2.9 rebs, 30.9% from 3), and Lee (1.4 pts, 1.0 rebs, 25.0% from 3) were unremarkable role players on an unremarkable 19 win BYU team.

Fast forward a year where Connor and Lee now have a full season of D-1 exp under their belts and Nixon and Seljaas have more experience in their roles off the bench (as seniors) combined with TJ, Yo and a couple of transfers that team became something special.

It's easy to look superficially at the 2019-20 team and say they were good only because of Yo, TJ and Toolson but that would only be partly true. What made that team special was the productivity they got from their bench/role players. As opposing teams game-planned to try and defend studs like Yo, TJ and Toolson, our role players (I'm actually including AB here) made them pay for it.

They each improved immensely over the year before and played a huge role in our team being #1 in the nation in 3pt% and top 5 in offensive efficiency. These were the guys spotting up in corners hitting open catch and shoot 3's, picking and popping and slipping screens/making backdoor cuts when their defensive player took a step towards helping on Yo, TJ or Toolson. They carved up opposing teams with their experienced, high IQ play.

We don't have the star power yet that we had with Yo, TJ or Toolson but we're putting together the solid nucleus of role players who will be the difference makers like Seljaas, Nixon, etc were. We just need guys like Fouss, Khalifa, Baker, Glover, etc to step up and do enough to get us by until we get studs like Davis and Chandler etc on the court.