Doyel: Kelan Martin’s game is expanding by the hour

This is not a fluke. This is what is really happening: Kelan Martin is getting better. Better than he was a year ago? Well, yes — obviously — but his improvement is coming faster than that. He’s getting better by the month. By the week.

By the game.

This is ridiculous, what he’s doing, but it’s really happening. Three days ago, in his 55th game at Butler, Kelan Martin set a  career high with 27 points against Marquette.

Tuesday night, in his 56th game, he blew past that number — he scored 35 points, leading Butler past Georgetown 87-76 in a game the Bulldogs simply had to win.

Butler’s biggest victories this season came in December, and while those wins were of high quality — at Cincinnati, and against Purdue on a neutral court — that was two months ago. Since then the Bulldogs have started Big East play and stumbled to a 3-6 start entering Tuesday.

See why they needed this game? Teams that are 3-7 in their conference, doesn’t matter what conference, aren’t much for an NCAA tournament selection committee to look at. Not like 4-6 is all that much better, but it is better. And this is what momentum could look like, Butler winning two of its past three games with two more imminently winnable games next: at St. John’s, then at Seton Hall. Start stacking wins, and Butler (15-7, 4-6) is 6-6 in the league and 17-7 overall and looking very much like an NCAA tournament team.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s stick with what we know, especially when what we know is as delicious as this:

Kelan Martin’s ceiling is somewhere off in the distance, up in the rafters, somewhere so far away that you can’t even guess at it from here. All you can do is understand where he was 2½ years ago, when 2½ years ago he was a back-to-the-basket player at Ballard High School in Louisville. And he was good at it. No, he was great at it.

Martin has been bigger than everyone since he was a baby, and that’s no joke. He was that kid that other parents at the youth basketball league were wondering aloud about, jokingly wanting to see his birth certificate, because there’s no way a 10-year-old can be close to 6-feet tall. No way an eighth-grader can be 6-6. That’s grown man size!

Parents would get a look at Martin’s parents and shut up, for every possible reason. His dad, Kenneth, is a big man who finished his career among Ballard’s top 15 scorers, then helped Kentucky Wesleyan to the Division II national title. His mom, Kristie, had her jersey retired at Ballard and played collegiately at Western Kentucky.

Kelan was born to play basketball, is what I’m saying. And he was born huge, so he was playing in the post. And he was dominating. Entering his senior season at Ballard he was on pace to top 2,000 points, but he and his family realized that he was too small to excel in the post in college. Time to learn a new position.

That was 2½ years ago.

You think he’s learned all there is to learn about the perimeter in 2½ lousy years? He’s not a grown man, not as a college wing. He’s a toddler. He’s a baby.

Babies get bigger. They get better. Kelan Martin’s game is expanding by the hour, and what happened to Georgetown on Tuesday night was a nightmare Hoyas coach John Thompson III could have predicted.

“Obviously Martin had one of those special nights,” Thompson said, “but he’s been building toward that. You could see that coming.”

It’s as simple as this. In the first six games of the season, against mostly inferior competition, Martin averaged 10.7 points and 5.4 rebounds. In the past six games, all against the Big East, Martin is averaging 21.5 ppg and 8.2 rpg.

Here’s the thing. He’s not just learning how to play the perimeter after years in the post. He’s learning a new spot on the perimeter, as well. Since coming to Butler, Martin has been more of a stretch four — a power forward who can shoot from the perimeter. He has been a mismatch for other teams, too quick and athletic to be guarded by most power forwards, and as such, he’s carved out a niche as a splash of instant offense off the bench.

With Butler down a perimeter player since losing point guard Tyler Lewis (concussion) four games ago, the Bulldogs have shifted Roosevelt Jones from the wing to the point, Kellen Dunham from small forward to shooting guard and Martin from stretch-four to small forward.

That was four games ago.

Here’s what Martin has done in those four games: 23 ppg.

“I’ve been coming out to practice, practicing hard every day, getting extra shots up,” Martin said. “Learn the game more. Become a better player.”

Done and done. Georgetown’s coach, Thompson, was saying Martin and Providence’s Ben Bentil are the two most improved players in the league. Bentil’s scoring has skyrocketed from 6.4 ppg last season to 20.3 ppg this season.

Martin has gone from 7.1 ppg to 15.7 ppg, and he is rampaging now. A career-high 27 two games ago. A new career-high in his next game, 35 points, the most by a Butler player since Matthew Graves had 42 in 1998 against Cleveland State.

Kelan Martin could get more some day. He could get more some day soon.

Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter: at@GreggDoyelStar or atwww.facebook.com/gregg.doyel.