2024 NCAA Tournament: Ranking the top 20 Players from the West Region

4. DaRon Holmes II (Dayton)

One of college basketball’s most exciting players, Holmes has spent three years at Dayton and is the reason why this team finds themselves in the NCAA Tournament for the first time in seven years. He’s originally a Top 40 forward from Arizona who found his way to the Flyers and has already been putting up monster numbers in his career, really culminating in his junior year.

Holmes was named both A-10 Player of the Year and A-10 Defensive Player of the Year, averaging 20.4 points, 8.4 rebounds, and 2.6 assists per game for a Flyers team that earned an at-large bid to the Big Dance. Not only was he the top scorer and rebounder in a talented A-10, Holmes was also one of the nation’s most efficient players while making 59% of his 2-pointers and 39% from long range. He had multiple 30-point efforts and can power the Flyers to wins in this Tournament with great performances.

3. Caleb Love (Arizona)

A 5-star guard from St. Louis, Love played the first three seasons of his college career at North Carolina. He was a star for the Tar Heels, leading the program to the national championship game as a sophomore, but opted to transfer after the program struggled last season. If last season could be considered a down year then Love has certainly bounced back nicely in his new home with the Wildcats.

Love averages 18.1 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 3.4 assists for the best individual figures of his career while leading Arizona to another Pac-12 regular season title. He’s a high-volume scorer who was named Pac-12 Player of the Year in his only season in the league. He showed his value in an early season win at Duke and later dropped 36 points on the road against Oregon. Arizona was far from perfect but the offseason addition of Love goes down as one of the key moves of this past offseason, especially if he can get Arizona seriously deep into this Tournament as the 2-seed.