Xavier 2016 season in review: Myles Davis player report card

Thanks to everyone who participated in our second annual Banners on the Parkway postseason player report cards. We'll be breaking down each player's grades for the rest of this week and on into next week, where we'll reveal the top finisher according to the community. We'll also be assigning and explaining our own grades of each player. We'll start with the player who got the lowest community ranking and work our way up to the MVP.

There was one voter who went through and gave everyone an F. I probably could have just taken his data out, but it doesn't make that much of a difference in the end result. What's more confusing to me is that one other person also saw fit to give Myles an F. Beyond that, the community was basically evenly split on whether Myles was an A or a B, and his GPA puts him within touching distance of the Dean's list (I think; it has been a while since I cared about a dean). However you slice it, it's clear that a three-star recruit whose career got off to not one but two NCAA-imposed false starts is now solidly ensconced in the upper echelon of the Xavier roster.

Offense: A

There's not a lot more you could realistically expect Myles to do on offense. He played both guard positions this year, both filling in for and running alongside Sumner when at the point and also doing his usual catch-and-shoot thing from the two. He was near the top of the conference in assist rate and had reasonable ball security numbers. He was a top shooter in the Big East and was even courteous enough to shoot an easy to calculate 40-100 from beyond the arc in conference play. If you had offered any reasonable Xavier fan what Myles gave this year on the offensive end, they would have immediately accepted.

Aside from his solid numbers, Myles also served as Xavier's coach on the floor. He filled that kind of Dante Jackson memorial role as the guy who would huddle everyone up at dead balls and encourage them to... do whatever it was they needed to be doing. When the sledding got tough, Myles was the one the team put on the ball and trusted to make good decisions. 28/34ths of the time, it worked.

Defense: C

It wasn't good. Myles can rebound okay for a guard, which - as any big man who has gotten a seal on his guy only to watch an opposing guard come in and pilfer the board can tell you - isn't nothing. Beyond that though, Myles is a subpar man defender and at his best when he's least noticed in the 1-3-1. His rotations on the wing occasionally seemed a half-step late, causing him to give up a bucket and often a foul instead of cutting off a pass. Myles wasn't recruited to be a lockdown defender, which is good.

Overall: B

On the whole, this is a borderline A. Despite his defensive flaws, Davis is a huge part of what the team does. He hung out near the top of the power rankings all year, and there were certainly times at which he was the team's best - or at least most valuable - player. Myles is, for the most part, exactly what Xavier needs him to be.