photo by: Nick Krug

Kansas University freshman big man Carlton Bragg gets a shot up during warm-ups, prior to the Jayhawks' exhibition opener against Pittsburg State, on Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2015, at Allen Fieldhouse.

Of all of the sophomores in all of college basketball, Sports Illustrated’s Luke Winn believes the one guy ready to make the biggest leap might reside in Lawrence, Kansas.

In the eighth edition of Winn’s Sophomore Breakout Formula, KU’s Carlton Bragg landed at the top of the list of players who could be in for a monster season.

Here’s the way Winn comes up with the list:

— The Sophomore Breakout Formula identifies scoring potential in players who didn’t put up significant points as freshmen, yet had promising advanced-statistical profiles. The formula strives to avoid too-obvious selections, and therefore its 2016-17 picks are restricted to players that averaged single-digit points last season and played not much more than 20 minutes per game. —

The happy-go-lucky Bragg’s averages of 3.8 points in 8.9 minutes a season ago put him right in the wheelhouse of the kinds of players Winn is looking for with this formula.

The list is short and aims to identify only those players who truly stand to make a meaningful jump from what they did as freshmen.

There’s no doubt that Bragg is aware of the opportunity that awaits. The Cleveland native has been working as hard as anybody on his game this offseason and has added serious bulk to his lanky frame, a move that should help him be more productive — if not dangerous — all over the floor during the upcoming season.

Winn is far from the only person who expects big things from Bragg this season. The expectation in and around Lawrence is that Bragg will both start and star in his new role with the Jayhawks and his prep coach, Babe Kwasniak, said after a visit with his former player earlier this summer that Bragg was in for “a monster season.”

Here’s what Winn had to say about Bragg, heading into his second season as a Jayhawk:

There’s opportunity galore in the
Jayhawks’ frontcourt, as departed big
men Perry Ellis, Jamari Traylor,
Cheick Diallo and Hunter Mickelson
combined for 59.1 minutes per game
last season. Bragg is the obvious heir
to Ellis’s face-up four role, and in
short stints as a freshman, Bragg took
a higher percentage of Kansas’s shots
than everyone other than Ellis and
guard Wayne Selden Jr., who’s also off
to the pros.

The Jayhawks’ go-to-guys are likely to
be on the perimeter–veteran point
guards Frank Mason and Devonte’
Graham, and possible No. 1 NBA draft
pick Josh Jackson can all score–but
coach Bill Self’s offense isn’t going
to abandon the post. Bragg should get
plenty of touches, and his
small-sample efficiency thus far in
the post (he had a team-high 1.41
points per possession there last
season) and as a spot-up shooter has
been encouraging. He added 26 pounds
of muscle this off-season to better
handle the physicality of the Big 12,
and it’s easy to envision his scoring
average increasing from 3.8 as a
freshman to double-digits as a
sophomore.