College Basketball: The Top 5 Midseason Player of the Year Candidates

4. Luke Kennard, Duke Blue Devils

Before all the Duke haters flip their lid, hear me out.

There have been many non-basketball related issues revolving around the Blue Devils this year. Grayson Allen's tripping and subsequent suspension, head coach Mike Krzyzewski's absence and his recent measures to ban players from the locker room. Above all, though, the biggest problem has been on the court.

The Blue Devils are 15-5 through 20 games, and are definitely not playing up to their preseason number-one ranking. All the same, three of those teams were ranked within the top 15, so it hasn't been easy sledding by any means.

Through it all, Luke Kennard has been the rock of a team starving for a leader. In 34.7 minutes a game, the sophomore is averaging 19.8 points, 2.3 three-pointers and 5.5 rebounds per contest. He's converting on an impressive 53% of his shots from the field, 43.8% from three and 86.7% from the line.

Kennard's amazing efficiency places him second in the country in win shares, with 4.6, and 10th with a rate of .264 win shares per 40 minutes (the length of a regulation game). His player efficiency rating of 26.2 is nothing to scoff at either, as it marks a massive improvement from his PER of 19.5 a year ago.

The fruits of Kennard's improved efficiency have been eye-opening as well. His 11.2 box plus-minus (BPM) -- a box score estimate of the points per 100 possessions a player has contributed above a league-average player, translated to an average team -- ranks 16th among all NCAA players, and he's done so against some tough competition. By Ken Pomeroy's calculations, Duke has faced the 30th-hardest defensive schedule of 351 teams.

On a team struggling to reach its potential, Kennard is doing much more than attaining his. So far, he has been one of the best players in the country.