Freshman phenom: Jaycee Carroll

Jaycee Carroll spent two years serving a Latter-day Saint mission in Chile. During that time, the freshman guard didn’t have much time to play basketball. When game opportunities came up, Carroll played on concrete courts with thick-rimmed hoops and wooden backboards.

“There aren’t many high-quality gyms in Chile,” he said.

He returned home to Evanston, Wyo., in early August, just weeks before school started.

“My second day back I was up in the gym, shooting and trying to get back into the swing of the things. It was tough. I was breathing heavy and I got tired a lot quicker then when I left.”

For three weeks Carroll worked out and readied himself for his freshman season at Utah State.

With early season injuries to guards Chris Huber and Marques Crane, the possibility of redshirting became almost nonexistent for Carroll.

“I didn’t want to redshirt,” he said. “I didn’t want to sit out of basketball for another year. I wanted to get back in shape and play.”

The freshman was ready to play. In his first game, an exhibition against the University of Puget Sound, Carroll scored a game-high 29 points.

Despite his inexperience at the collegiate level, Carroll said he expects more out of himself than an average freshman.

“I came home and figured that if I hadn’t gone on a mission this would be my junior year, and I expect to play like a junior.”

Currently, Carroll is the Aggies’ second-leading scorer at 14.4 points per game. Monday he was named the Big West Conference Freshman of the Year.

After a cold shooting performance in the final regular season game of the year, Carroll said he expects to turn things around in Friday’s BWC tournament.

“We’re going to play hard,” he said. “We’re going in with a lot of confidence and we’re going to have some success.”

Carroll and the Aggies play the highest remaining seed in the tourney at 8:30 p.m. Friday.

-acf@cc.usu.edu

(Photo by John Zsiray)