What Tshiebwe's Departure Means for West Virginia
Friday morning, West Virginia head coach Bob Huggins announced in a press release that sophomore forward Oscar Tshiebwe would be "stepping away" from the program due to personal reasons.
After having an outstanding freshman campaign by leading the team in both scoring (11.2 ppg) and rebounding (9.3 rpg), Tshiebwe's production plummeted in the first ten games of this season averaging just 8.5 points and 7.8 rebounds and shooting ten percentage points worse at the free-throw line than last season.
There have been games where Tshiebwe got himself in foul trouble early and there were times where he just didn't "bring it" early, which caused Bob Huggins to replace him with either Gabe Osabuohien or true freshman Isaiah Cottrell.
Even though Tshiebwe has not played up to the level everyone expects, his departure really hurts the Mountaineers' depth in the frontcourt. True freshman Isaiah Cottrell was lost for the season after suffering an Achilles injury on Tuesday vs Northeastern, so that leaves just Osabuohien and true freshman Seny N'diaye, who was not expected to play much this season.
This will force Huggins and his staff to try and get N'diaye up to speed so that he can play a role off the bench. Osabuohien will likely end up sliding into the starting lineup unless the Mountaineers want to play small ball and throw Taz Sherman in and play Culver as the team's only true big man. With the look of the current roster, that may end up being the best way for West Virginia to try and win games. Spread the floor, run the offense through the guards and let Culver do his thing underneath. Heck, maybe playing only one big is what Culver needs to be even more efficient than he already is on the offensive end of the floor. It'll give him more room to operate if the opposing team has to worry about four guys that can shoot from beyond the arc.
Regardless of how West Virginia alters their lineup/rotation, Tshiebwe "stepping away" is a big loss. He is not in the transfer portal as of this morning and there is no indication as to whether or not Tshiebwe will return to the team.
***UPDATE: Moments ago, Bob Huggins stated in his press conference that Tshiebwe will "absolutely not" return to the program.***
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