Northwestern Basketball: Wildcats 2019-20 season review

Northwestern’s Top Players from the Season

Miller Kopp

The sophomore forward paced the Wildcats in scoring at 13.1 points per game on solid shooting percentages, going 41.2% from the field, 39.6% from three, and 89.6% at the line. Kopp was undoubtedly the most-improved player for NU after averaging under five points per game as a freshman last season. His best performance of the season came in NU’s final home game against Penn State on March 7th when he put up 21p/2r/3a with 5 threes in an 80-69 win. Kopp’s ongoing development into a consistent offensive performer will be important for the Wildcats next season as many of Kopp’s coldest shooting performances from this year coincided with bad losses.

Pat Spencer

Spencer joined the Northwestern roster as a graduate transfer after an extremely productive lacrosse career at Loyola (MD) where he was a four-time All-American, 2019 National Player of the Year, and set the Division I all-time record for assists. Fans were generally skeptical that Spencer could be an impactful player coming from another sport. He quickly proved the doubters wrong when he scored 23 points and tallied eight assists in a win against Bradley early in the season. He turned out to be a multi-sport assist specialist, leading the Wildcats with 3.9 assists per game. Spencer finished the season with 10.4 points per game and, although his shot-making fluctuated throughout, posted a respectable 43.6% from the field.

Boo Buie

Buie, a freshman guard from Georgia, definitely showed promise this year despite only starting in 11 of his 26 games played. Although his shooting percentages took a turn for the worse in the second half of the season, Buie showed potential as a scoring threat in a few games – namely a contest against Michigan State where he scored 26 points and went 5-7 from beyond the arc. He ended the year averaging 10.3 points per game to go with 2.4 assists and 2.1 rebounds.

Ryan Young

Young put together a respectable campaign as a redshirt freshman at the center position. He started every game and finished the season as the team’s leading rebounder at 6.1 per contest. He also averaged nine points on 53.5% shooting. In a December victory against SIU-Edwardsville, Young scored 25 points and pulled in 12 rebounds, both season-highs, while shooting 73.3% from the field. His best conference contest of the season came in a loss at Maryland where he was good for 17 points and eight boards.