Jul 6, 2012

Stew's top 20: No. 20 - Brady Jardine

Outside of one key statistic, one could argue that Brady Jardine really doesn't have any business being in the top 20. With individual statistics, Jardine rarely got the chance to light things up, spending his entire career behind one of the best to every play at USU. But in the bigger picture of the most important statistic (wins), Jardine was technically better than any other Aggie... ever!

If you were lucky enough to have seen Jardine at his best, you'd understand why his inclusion on this list is a no-brainer. Were it not for his injury, he likely would have landed much higher, as he would have probably threatened to average a double-double this past year. At the very least, he likely would have taken away Donnie Johnson's claim of the highest single-season rebounding average of 8.3 per game.

Numbers aside, Jardine was the epitome of a high-energy and high-character guy that you want nothing more than to see him succeed. He was the ultimate x-factor who could change the course of any game at any point with his play-making capabilities. And that's just what he did on a seemingly routine basis. Whether it was swatting Luke Babbitt into the fifth row, swatting Babbitt in the middle of the loudest moment ever or just posterizing the soul right out of Mitchell Young's body (greatest dunk in Utah State history), Jardine made a handful of the single biggest plays of the winningest three-year stretch in USU history.

Topping it all off is the fact that Jardine won a higher percentage of games than any other player in the program's history. If that doesn't get you in the top 20, then this list would just be garbage.

1 comment:

  1. I always saw Brady as a great leader. I was actually expecting to see him a bit higher on this countdown and I think that he probably should be a little bit ahead of some of the other guys that I assume will end up ahead of him. Sure he may not have been at the top of very many statistics but I believe he contributed quite a bit to the fact that he had a higher winning percentage than any other player in history and really winning is the only statistic that matters.

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