Though inconsistent at times, Van Vliet contributed significantly in his single year in Williamsburg, making up one half of the best frontcourt in the conference.

Overview

Spring 2018, news broke that Andy Van Vliet was transferring from Wisconsin to William and Mary. His reputation was as a good shooter and skilled big man, but that he was not physical enough to be successful in the Big 10. And, honestly, that reputation was pretty spot on.

I remember hearing from friends in and around the program during his redshirt year that he was tearing it up in practice. It made sense — Tony Shaver’s fast-paced, three-happy style played to Van Vliet’s strengths. Also, it looked as if Van Vliet would fit well in a two-big lineup with Nathan Knight playing the 5. Overall, my expectations were raised.

Compared to those expectations, Van Vliet might have disappointed a little bit. A new head coach and a bigger load on his shoulders may have contributed to that. But, while not a gamebreaker, he had a solid season, picking up All-CAA Third Team honors. He averaged 13.2 points and 8.7 rebounds per game, stretching the floor by shooting 35.8% from behind the arc. (Maybe a little surprisingly based on the eye test, only 40.9% of his shots were three-pointers.)

There was a stretch of games in the middle of the year, around the Morehead St. game until the home matchup with UNCW, where it felt like nobody could guard Van Vliet. During that set of 11 games, he shot 53.8% from the floor, in double-digits 10 times with five double-doubles. He was a key cog in the machine as the Tribe found its footing down the non-conference stretch and rolled into first place in the CAA early in the year. However, like some recent Tribe shooters (most notably Matt Milon), Van Vliet was incredibly streaky. He struggled to put the ball in the basket towards the end of the season, especially from inside the arc. Over the last 11 games of the year, he shot 37.5% from the field. In that same span, he shot just 28.5% from three, which is honestly not as bad as I thought he shot the ball as the conference season was winding down.

To his credit, he kept playing hard. Over the entire year, Van Vliet was better defensively than I thought he would be. As a 7-footer playing the 4, sometimes he would guard a 6-foot-6 wing, and sometimes he would guard a 6-foot-10 big; he held his own in both scenarios. Against James Madison at home, he had a career-high 8 blocks. Against Delaware, he tallied 6. And he consistently rebounded, except in that abysmal home loss to Hofstra when he only grabbed a single board.

At the end of the day, Van Vliet was a good piece on a good team. He complimented Nathan Knight extremely well, and even had games where he took over and carried the load for the Tribe. While he might have struggled down the stretch shooting the ball, he continued to do what he could, rebounding and playing defense. William and Mary will miss a player like Van Vliet, and I certainly will miss watching him play.

Here’s a Number: 26.3%

We’ve talked a lot about the way Andy Van Vliet shot the ball, so we’ll move onto how well he rebounded. For someone with a reputation of being “soft,” Van Vliet was a very good defensive rebounder. In fact, his Defensive Rebound Percentage (an estimation of the percentage of available defensive rebounds he secured) was 26.3%. In other words, Van Vliet grabbed over a quarter of the possible defensive rebounds he could. That number ranked 36th in the nation. For that fact, his size was very valuable to the Tribe defense.

A Lasting Memory

Over his short career in Williamsburg, Andy Van Vliet became a fan favorite, because who doesn’t love a 7-footer who can drain threes? (By the way, if you heard A-V-V chants, that was probably us.) So his senior day, while mostly a salute to Nathan Knight, was also great for him.

It might have been an omen that the game against Elon was a little too close for comfort (don’t remind us of what happened next time), but the Tribe eventually pulled away a little bit. Up 11 with a little more than two minutes to go in the game, Thornton Scott found Van Vliet all alone in the front court off the inbounds, and Van Vliet threw down a thunderous dunk. It was a wonderful sendoff for a player we really enjoyed watching.

(An honorable mention lasting memory? His five treys in the early-season win over Wofford — the first, “wow, this team might be good” moment.)

H/T to Sports Reference for providing access to advanced statistics for this post.