Texas Tech basketball: There’s no need to panic after 3-straight losses

This team’s considerable youth will develop

At this time last year, seven of the 13 players on this year’s roster were still in high school going to homeroom and pep rallies.  Thus, it should be no surprise that their baptism into the world of college basketball has left them looking rather lost at times.

Consider that Beard’s 2017-18 team had only three freshmen, Jarrett Culver, Zhaire Smith, and Davide Moretti playing significant roles and last year’s team had just Kyler Edwards as the lone freshman contributor and you can see how unique the current team is.

This year, the Red Raiders are receiving 92.3 minutes per game combined from their freshmen.  Considering that a team has only 200 minutes of time to divide up among its roster per game, you can see that nearly half of Tech’s minutes are coming from first-year players.

What’s more, the absence of the top freshman, Ramsey, is forcing senior Chris Clarke to start which means that Beard’s bench is almost 100% freshman with Kevin McCullar, Andre Savrasov, Russell Tchewa, and Clarence Nadolny joining sophomore walk-on Avery Benson as the players Beard can turn to in order to give his starters some rest.

These young players are only eight games into their careers.  In his first eight games, Culver had three games with four points or less while Zhaire Smith had two six-point games and a scoreless showing.  Finally, look at the start Keenan Evans got off to in 2014-15 when he averaged just five points in his first eight games with only one of those being a double-digit output.

Just consider how different Ramsey and Shannon have been in that regard already.  Ramsey is averaging 17.3 points per game while Shannon is averaging 9.6 and his 24 points against DePaul are more than either Evans or Smith had as freshmen and just two off of Culver’s freshman season-high of 26.

At times, guys like McCullar (who had his worst outing of the year in Chicago), Savrasov, Tchewa, and Nadolny have looked every bit the part of freshmen and that included Wednesday when they combined for just four points.  But they will look like different players by the time this season reaches the heat of the Big 12 race and when that glossy-eyed look disappears from their faces, they could prove to be an asset for Beard.