OOH Olah! ‘Cats Make It Official With Pair of Hoops Big Men

Why does LTP think Olah will be the starting center next year over Cerina who has spent a year practicing with the team?
Olah played for Romania in the U-18 B Tournment — not against the good players in the A Division — and he played against weak competition in a Christian school league in Indiana.
That is not the same as playing against Conference USA and Big Ten level talent for three years as Cerina has.
Carmody called Cerina the “best athlete on the team” and Carmody isn’t usually given to hyperbole.
NU’s starting lineup could be very athletic next year with Demps, Cobb, Crawford, Swopshire, and Cerina in the starting lineup — it could be the most athletic starting 5 in history.
With Cerina and Swopshire in the lineup, perhaps NU will opponents’ second-shot opportunities, making it not necessary to replace all of Shurna’s 20 ppg next year as it will hold opponents to fewer points.
The NCAA tournament still seems like a reach but yet another NIT team seems certain thanks to the deepest and most athletic team in history.

WLAX: NU 17 NOTRE DAME 7

Cats now 15-1.
Regular Season finale against Virgina Saturday at noon at Lakeside Field.

Am I missing something? Did Cobb transfer or something? Why don’t these projected starting 5′s include him?

Obviously, we’ll have to wait til the fall to understand who is ready to step into the rotation (as well as how effectively — or not — Carmody utilizes this new depth), but it is exciting to have so many seemingly legitimate talents on the same roster for this program.

Even our “best” teams have suffered from a stark fall-off from the top 2-3 guys (going way back, Aaron, Goode, Stack and filler; Jitim, Hachad, Vedran and TJ Parker all logged 37+ minutes/game in B10 play and had little backing them on the bench).

If Cobb continues his late season form (a highly reasonable assumption if healthy) and Sobo takes another step with a year of growth and perhaps 6-7 minutes/night on the bench, then you don’t even need all of the 7 newcomers (including the 3 on the bench last year) to step in.

As long as the 20-something Shropshire and Cerina perform to a reasonable level, you only need 2 of the 5 FR (incl RS FR) to contribute meaningfully to have our strongest 9 deep in program history. My prediction is worth the letters I am typing, but I will throw it out there: I see Demps and Abrahamson stepping up in meaningful roles, with Turner and Olah providing depth minutes at 4 and 5.

Finally, in regards Marco. Lots of people want to slide him pretty far down the two deep, and there are certainly reasons to slot him for a more situational role (there are flaws in his game for sure). That said, he is the one guy who brings Craig Moore-like fire onto the court, and I think that quality outweighs any issues with his streaky shooting and silly fouls (and earn him that 6th man role).

great point, and why i actually think there is not really an \or else\ urgency to next year. The urgency is there for sure, but I think we all need to get used to coach carmody staying on as long as he wants to. he’s addressed the two issues that this board has consistently hammered at, lack of depth, and lack of front line size.

while these don’t let him off the hook for poor coaching choices at the end of key games, i think when he looked up and down the bench at the end of this last season and couldn’t find options or energy his hands were a bit tied – that makes marginal tactics look even worse when they don’t work. the bad endings were the residue of poor roster planning, poor recruiting and the wash out of a couple of bigs over the last couple of years – he seems to have really addressed this stuff, and found a likely shurna replacement too…

i’m excited about this incoming group, and will predict that olah red shirts but that abrahamson will get big minutes as the new john shurna – if you watch his clips the kid can fill it up from 3 point land.