Australian Rules Basketball

Melbourne native Ben Simmons could have played anywhere in the world. So how did the top-ranked freshman end up in Baton Rouge?

- Dana O'Neil

Kickoff between Auburn and LSU is still two hours away, but the main artery around Baton Rouge’s Tiger Stadium is barely passable. As four towering basketball players try to snake their way through the masses, a man passes by, his long hair spilling from under a white baseball cap, an LSU T-shirt wrapped across his barrel chest. Without breaking stride, he folds his hands in prayer and casts his eyes upward, as if to the heavens. Instead, he’s staring up at Ben Simmons, the 6-foot-10, 19-year-old freshman who has traveled from Australia to resurrect LSU from its swampy hoops grave. “Please, God,’’ the LSU fan says, “just beat the hell outta everybody this year.’’

There have been a few saviors in high-tops here before—Pistol Pete, Shaq, Big Baby—but not like this. Simmons is the No. 1 freshman basketball player in the country, which makes him the No. 1 college player in the country, an athlete so gifted he defies a position (hybrid point center might be the most accurate). Not coincidentally, his choice to break rank from traditional college hoops powers and don purple and gold has raised more than a few eyebrows, the rumor mill percolating like a good pot of gumbo. Surely money was exchanged, critics have carped. LSU even took early criticism in May for a ticket-sales campaign proclaiming “He’s Coming,” alongside Simmons’ No. 25.