...I do think Emery was influenced this year (not sure who gets the credit, a coach or Nick himself) to slow down his pursuit of being the next Matt CArlino and instead started making the effort to be the next Jackson Emery. After struggling to fit in the first month or two with an offense where he wasn't the man and Mika was, he seemed to stop the chucking and started looking to contribute more on defense. His defense on Jared Brownridge in the first Santa Clara game was inspiring. I don't know that we always saw that focused of an effort on D but he did become BYU's best perimeter defender.

As for the others you listed, Bryant slowed down as well in forcing the ball (and getting offensive fouls) and started taking better shots but his defense never even reached the Jimmer level. Same with Haws, I can only think of only one game off the top of my head where I saw him really bear down on D and start scrapping and that was the 2nd half of the USC game when he lead our comeback from being 25 down (or so). Childs did a nice job blocking the occasional shot here and there but was not a good low post position defender and looked totally lost defending the PNR late in the year vs St Mary's.

I don't know that I ever saw any of those guys get yanked from a game right after a glaring mistake. Could've happened and I just didn't see it but usually the TV announcers and cameramen pick up on those obvious situations and zoom in.