Sun Belt Basketball: Ranking of 25 best players from last decade (2013-23)

21. Ronshad Shabazz

Although his teams would finish under .500 in every year of his college career, Shabazz made significant strides during his time in the Sun Belt. A 6’5 guard from Raleigh, North Carolina, Shabazz made his way to Appalachian State in 2015, just a year after the Mountaineers had transitioned into the Sun Belt. Things weren’t the best for the time, but his numbers were certainly impressive.

After averaging 11.9 points a game in his freshman year, Shabazz would become an even greater scorer, putting up 16.7 points per game as a sophomore and greater than 18 in each of his upperclassman seasons. He had a number of 30-point efforts (though the Mountaineers would lose all of them), and peaked with a 47-point outburst against Louisiana-Monroe as a senior. Shabazz also shot greater than 35% from long-range for his career and had decent assists numbers, spending some time as the program’s point guard.

Shabazz was named All-Sun Belt in each of his final three seasons and finished his career with 2067 career points, one of the highest marks of the decade. While he didn’t play on a winning team and certainly didn’t have postseason success, he was an experienced and talented scorer who did all he could while at Appalachian State. It’s hard to argue with his raw numbers, it’s just a shame there wasn’t more talent around him.