#Twitter Game Strong: The best CBB players to follow

It took (almost) 72 years, but it finally happened. Grant Gibbs exhausted his eligibility at Creighton. With that, Gibbs must give up his unofficial title as “College Basketball’s Best Player Twitter Follow”.

It’s with this thought in mind that we search. We search for the best college basketball players to follow on Twitter. We kept the search strictly to those that play, and kept coaches and administrators out of the quest because, we all know @CoachMiles and @CoachChrisMack have the Coach Twitter game on lockdown.

We judged players on three main criteria:

1.) Tweet volume – It’s a subjective phrase. It could be enough that they warrant a follow, but not so many tweets that they’re just simply responding to every little RT and subtweet they see. It’s not worth it to get 1-2 entertaining tweets to wade through a swamp of “haha ur crazy bruh!!!!” tweets. You’ve got to find a happy medium.

2.) Entertainment value – Duh. If you want to be the best college basketball player in the Twitter game, you’ve got to be able to get and keep an audience. Equal parts funny, interesting and smart. Though it doesn’t necessarily mean funny is a requirement. If it’s a guy who has thought-provoking or informative tweets, that’s definitely a good place to start.

3.) Personal quality – College dudes are gonna be college dudes. Lord knows I was one once. So it’s cool to have weird stuff going on in their feed. But as long as that feed is also fun to read, it’s fine. Keep cursing to a minimum, fandom and diversity to the maximum.

So, with the parameters set, we searched. Here’s what we found to be the top follows on the college basketball hardwood (complete with a ton of — probably unnecessary — hashtags).

Georges Niang (@GeorgesNiang20) – He’s a thought-provoking type who #appreciates the fan base he plays for at (RT) #IowaState. He also doesn’t mind crowd-sourcing things for his future, something that could serve the almost-#surefire pro after college. If that doesn’t work out, maybe he has a career as a #motivationaspeaker . He likes to tweet — over 11,200  to his credit — but most are with a positive vibe, so it’s alright.

Fred VanVleet (@FredVanVleet) – VanVleet might be the most #grateful college #hooper on #Twitter. He came out of high school with little #fanfare and since the success of the 2012-13 #WichitaState squad he’s been one of the best point guards in the nation. He doesn’t take much for granted and lets you know it, but won’t clog up your #feed (less than 5,000 tweets). He’s also cool with passing along the love to others. Also, dude’s a #realist.

Kyle Wiltjer (@kwiltj) – The guy loves to #clown. The former #Kentucky forward and current #Gonzaga transfer loves to roll over his #Instagram game into Twitter, but still uses the good stuff in 140 characters. He also likes to throw in a few #struggletweets. All in a neat package of less than 5,000 tweets.

Dakari Johnson (@SafariDakari44) – The #Kentucky big man loves to #motivate, isn’t afraid to #askaquestion and, damn it, he’s proud to be from #Merica. The probable future #NBADraft pick give you an #insideview into his day and loves a good #movie. He also does it all in less than 7,000 tweets. On a team full of stars, Johnson takes the Twitter prize.

Oh and that Twitter name is awesome.

Sam Dekker (@samdek1) – Dekker, along with being one of the top returning players in the #B1G and a linchpin in the #WisconsinBadgers hopes for a second straight #FinalFour, mixes a blend of bro humor, sports savvy and general opinion . A true pioneer in the #TwitterCBB game with #HotSportTakes, #diverse #sports interests and all that. It’s just a shame he doesn’t tweet more, with only 325 to date.

Did I miss anyone? Let me know on Twitter at @David_Harten or at tbbchronicles@gmail.com.