The case for Myles Davis

I observed earlier this week that Xavier has six guys who have a pretty solid case for making the starting five. Once you all checked the math on that, a discussion broke out about who should be the odd man out. I figured that would happen; what surprised me was that two of Xavier's most senior team members were the ones on the short end of the stick.

The first idea that came out were that Xavier should go small, pushing Trevon to the four and James Farr to the bench. The other was that X should start Trevon at the three, sacrificing a guard to get two bigs on the floor. The guard people usually chose to bench was Myles. Here is why James should start:

He is the team's best shooter

I know there are other guys who have good cases for this title, but Trevon and JP faded last year, Remy doesn't hunt shots, and none of the freshmen have proven anything yet. Any of the guys named above could be a go-to shooter on a tournament team; Myles already has been.

Jalen Reynolds is a huge hacker

I'm sincerely hoping Jalen can get past this, but there are almost sure to be games where he is collecting fouls faster than the media is collecting timeouts. When those games occur, having a veteran big man to come off the bench and preserve the setup of the team will be a nice luxury.

Myles is the team's vocal leader

When the breaks are beating the boys, someone needs a little less-than-gentle correction from a peer, or the crowd needs hyped, Myles is the one who is out there taking the lead. Xavier has some other guys with leadership skills, but nobody wears the mantle of the Dante Jackson Memorial Leadership Award quite like Myles does.