Admon Gilder averaged 13.7 points for the Texas A&M Aggies last season.
He also grabbed two steals a game, shot 38% from 3-point land, and even put up four assists and four rebounds per contest.
The scary part? Gilder did it all without playing at his natural position.
J.J. Caldwell – an ESPN Top 100 recruit in the 2016 class – was ruled ineligible last season by the NCAA due to a home-schooling issue. Given Caldwell’s impressive talents at the point guard position, there’s a good chance he would’ve landed the starting role in his freshman season.
So, Caldwell’s ineligibility left Texas A&M head coach Billy Kennedy in a bind, especially considering that the team’s depth at point was lacking – with former ESPN Top 100 guard Alex Robinson transferring to TCU the year prior.
That void at the most important position on the court resulted in Gilder and Lipscomb transfer J.C. Hampton sharing the load for the majority of the season.
The point guard-by-committee process wasn’t an entirely smooth one.
The Aggies finished 277th in the country in turnovers per game (14.2) and 321st in the country in turnover margin (-2.5).
Texas A&M committed 25 turnovers in back-to-back games against Kentucky and South Carolina in early January. There was also the 23-turnover performance at West Virginia, and a 22-turnover performance at Mississippi State.
But it wasn’t just Hampton and Gilder that had issues. Ball control was an issue for the majority of roster, mainly because of the lack of a true No. 1 point guard.
Fast forward to the present, where Gilder is embarking on a season that shouldn’t require him to shoulder the load at point.
Caldwell is expected to be on the court this season, and as long as his game hasn’t taken a significant step back after sitting out a year, it seems likely that he’ll have a great opportunity to fix the turnover woes that plagued this team last season.
He’ll also have help from Marquette grad transfer Duane Wilson – who averaged 12 points per game in his first two seasons before taking a step back last year.
If those two can sure up things at the point, that’ll allow Gilder to take a significant step forward at his natural position at shooting guard.
And most people don’t understand just how big that leap could be.
Gilder’s already proven that he can be a go-to scorer. When forward D.J. Hogg – one of the team’s other top scorers – started missing games and having to play limited minutes to injury, Gilder stepped his game up in tremendous fashion.
The first game that Hogg missed was against Ole Miss in late January. And after not hitting the 20-point mark a single time during his first 55 games at Texas A&M, Gilder produced these numbers in that particular game and the four that followed it:
- 22 points at Ole Miss
- 24 points at West Virginia
- 11 points vs. Vanderbilt
- 20 points at LSU
- 22 points vs. Missouri
He added 22 points in the regular season finale against Kentucky as well.
After going through the ups and downs of playing a lot of minutes at another position, I’d say Gilder came out of it looking pretty good.
It will be easy for those on the outside to overlook Gilder’s potential breakthrough. After all, Texas A&M does return leading scorer Tyler Davis and a future NBA lottery pick in Robert Williams. There’s also a healthy Hogg and other potential impact players elsewhere.
But overlooking Gilder’s late-season success would be a mistake.
That late-season success should transfer over into the ’17-18 campaign, and his confidence should be off the charts when he steps on the floor in November – at his natural spot – for his junior season in College Station.
And in doing so, it could make Gilder one of the most must-watch players in the SEC this season.
This story is a part of the “100 Reasons to Watch SEC Hoops in ’17-18” series.