NCAA Basketball enjoyed some great players around the start of this century. Who were some of the most important stars around that time?
The NCAA Basketball years 2000-2009 featured some amazing players, games, and tournament runs. Guys like Mateen Cleaves and Morris Peterson kicked off the decade when the “Flintstones” led Michigan State to a national championship in 2000. In 2003, two freshmen, Carmelo Anthony and Gerry McNamara, propelled Syracuse to a title.
We witnessed a dominant couple of years for Florida, as Joakim Noah and Al Horford carried the Gators to titles in 2006 and 2007. To cap things off in 2009, the North Carolina Tar Heels finished the decade, led by speedy guard, Ty Lawson.
During these ten seasons, five players managed to leave a legacy that stands above the rest. For this article, in order to be considered, players had to be consensus first-team All-Americans. There were certainly some good ones: Chris Paul at Wake Forest, Dwyane Wade at Marquette, and Adam Morrison at Gonzaga are certainly memorable.
In addition, their teams had to have won at an elite level. Guys like James Harden, who was a first team All-American at Arizona State in 2009, was 46-23 as a collegian, which is good but not like the guys on this list. Last, this list has nothing to do with future success. Plenty of good college players have gone on to have outstanding NBA careers, which often cloud our perceptions of who they were before the league.
The five players that follow were consistently dominant and often exceptional in big games. Let’s take a stroll down memory lane and meet the five most important players of the 2000s.