South Dakota State Basketball: Mike Daum is a name to remember

SALT LAKE CITY, UT – MARCH 16: Mike Daum /

Mike Daum was one of the top scorers in all of college basketball for South Dakota State basketball last season. Is he ready to do it again?

South Dakota State finished last season 18-17, with an 8-8 record in Summit League play, but it was led by one of the best scorers in the entire nation. As a sophomore this past year, Mike Daum averaged a ridiculous 25.1 points per game, which was the second-best number in the country, only trailing Central Michigan’s guard Marcus Keene.

An unranked recruit out of high school, Daum has quickly made a name for himself at the collegiate level. As a redshirt freshman in 2015-16, Daum played in 20.8 minutes per game and scored 15.2 points in each contest on a ridiculous 55.3% from the field and 44.6% from three. If expanded to a 40-minute role (full college basketball game), Daum would have averaged close to 30 points per game in just his first season.

In their lone NCAA Tournament game of the 2016 March Madness, Daum poured in 16 points and snagged six rebounds before falling to Maryland.

For his efforts, Daum was named to the All-Summit League First Team as well as being named the Summit League Sixth Man of the Year and Freshman of the Year.

Entering this past season, he was named the preseason Player of the Year, and he lived up to the hype. In an expanded role that had him playing 32.7 minutes per game, Daum averaged 25.1 points per contest on 51.4% from the field and 41.8% from three. His great combination of scoring inside and outside the arc at 6’9″ is what makes him such a tough cover on the offensive end, and his game is only getting more polished. In addition to his scoring output, Daum also secured 8.1 rebounds per game.

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For the season Daum had 12 games in which he scored 30+ as well as dropping 51 points and 15 rebounds in a game against Fort Wayne. Despite the Jackrabbits finishing in the middle of the conference, Daum put on a show in the Summit League Tournament as he tried to get his team back to the NCAA Tournament.

In the first game of the tournament, Daum went for 33 points on 9-for-18 shooting to get the victory for SDSU. Although a bit of a down game for the Dauminator, he had 18 points and nine rebounds in the Jackrabbits’ second game, where they knocked off the top seed in the tournament in South Dakota.

The championship game was then played between the Jackrabbits and Omaha. After games of 28 points and 33 points already against Omaha earlier in the season, Daum followed through with an even bigger game, going off for 37 points and 12 rebounds on 14-for-24 shooting. In doing so, South Dakota State came from being the four seed in the tournament to receiving the automatic bid to play in the NCAA Tournament.

In the Big Dance, they were matched up against Gonzaga, who beat Daum and Co. 66-46, as Daum’s 17 points and seven rebounds were not enough to make what would have been the biggest upset in tournament history happen.

Going into next season, Daum will once again lead the Jackrabbits, this time as a junior. He will be the preseason Player of the Year in the conference and the expectation for him will be to carry the Jackrabbits to the Big Dance again. His combination of size, rebounding, and flat-out scoring makes him one of the best players in the entire country.

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As he continues to develop, it would not be an overall surprise if we saw Mike Daum compete at an All-American level this next season. There are some extremely talented scorers and players at top programs across the country, but that doesn’t mean that Daum should be ignored. He is one of the top competitors nationwide and he will make every game difficult for his opponents to cover him.