Dereon Seabron had a way of getting to the hoop that seemed unnatural. While he did make it look easy, "effortless" is the wrong word. He would often make one strong move to get around the first man, then use his long frame to stretch the ball past the defenders and into the basket. I kept thinking that opposing coaches would figure it out and find a way to keep the career 25% 3-point shooter out of the lane. But they didn't.

I thought someone would stop him because he did it so often. What I failed to realize is that they couldn't stop him because he did it so well. His talent for getting to the rim on his own is truly exceptional. He is a singular talent that may have produced an NCSU record that may never be broken: 138 Unassisted made shots at the rim in a single season.

I don't know that anyone tracks this particular stat. Probably as a result of some conspiracy to hide the greatness of Dereon Seabron. But I put it together using total field goal attempts and the following stats from Hoop-Math.com:

• % of Field Goals taken at the rim (% of FG at Rim): This is the % of your total shots that are taken at the rim.
• FG% of Field Goals taken at the rim (FG% at Rim): This is the % of shots taken at the rim that are successful.
• % of shots at the rim that are assisted (%Assisted at Rim): The % of shots a player takes at the rim that were preceded by an assist from another player.

That's a total of 5 players going all the way back to the '17-'18 season. All of them big men, with the exception of the Maritime Lebron himself. You'll want to direct your attention to the column on the far right. Usually a high % of shots at the rim correlates with a high % of attempts following an assist. Do you remember Wyatt Walker creating his own shot? You did not, and he did not. But Seabron did.

This chart turns all those nerd stats into actual shots on goal and really drives home the point:

So that proves that Dereon made a lot more unassisted shots than a bunch of bigs. He also took a lot more shots. So how does he compare to some of the higher-volume shooters State has put on the floor:

I left off some other prolific scorers (CJ Bryce, for example) due to their very low % of shots at the rim. Al Freeman, Torin Dorn, and Terquavion Smith combined to hit a total of 164 shots at the rim in the seasons I checked. That's only 26 more than Seabron did by himself last year.

You may ask yourself, how does Seabron compare to the rest of the NCAA in this very specific stat? He was 2nd last year. Daylen Kountz, the point guard for the Northern Colorado Rattlers (probably), figured out the two-pronged strategy to taking the crown from Dereon:

1. shoot constantly
2. if you don't give up the ball then no one can pass it to you.

Sticking to this plan led him to take 561 total shots and only be assisted on 6.5% of his shots at the rim. Daylen had to attempt 154 more field goals in order to beat our hero by 21 measley makes at the rim in 2022.

Dereon Seabron hit more unassisted shots at the rim than three entire teams: Pepperdine, IUPUI, and Austin Peay. Seabron's total would have put him 1st in in the NCAA in 2021 (COVID-shortened) and 2020. I stopped checking after that because we all get the point: Dereon Seabron is a special talent and we were lucky to have him.