Busting Brackets
Fansided

AAC Basketball: 2020-21 breakout candidates from each team

By Holden Walter-Warner

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - APRIL 20: Boogie Ellis #23 passes during the Jordan Brand Classic boys high school all-star basketball game at T-Mobile Arena on April 20, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - APRIL 20: Boogie Ellis #23 passes during the Jordan Brand Classic boys high school all-star basketball game at T-Mobile Arena on April 20, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images) /
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Photo by Joe Robbins/Getty Images
Photo by Joe Robbins/Getty Images /

G Boogie Ellis, Memphis

Deep breath, Memphis fans. It was a wild season, beginning with a hyped recruiting class that was dismantled almost as soon as the season started by James Wiseman’s NCAA battle and NBA departure. With Precious Achiuwa likely to remain in the NBA Draft, the 2020-21 season will give Penny Hardaway a chance to reset.

Part of that reset will be mining that 2019 recruiting class for more production than it provided, which was already plentiful. That starts with Boogie Ellis, who should still be fighting to be the team’s point guard of the future.

Ellis had an up-and-down freshman season with the Tigers. He ultimately averaged 8.0 points, 3.3 rebounds and 1.5 assists per game. It was a tale of two halves for Ellis.

In the first half of the season, Ellis had some of his best games of the season, albeit against some weaker competition. But he also struggled from time to time, failing to score against Ole Miss and Tulane and losing his handle on a starting job by mid-January.

Ellis responded to that adversity by stepping up his consistency during the final seven weeks of the season. In one eight-game stretch, he scored at least 13 points in six of eight games, emerging as a potent scoring threat on the offensive end. He trailed off again at the end of the season, but the potential was clearly there.

There are a number of talented guards returning to Hardaway’s team next season. If Ellis develops into the five-star talent he is, those guards will fall by the wayside as Ellis carves out a bigger role.