Former Arizona Wildcats Big Man Starting Year Strong With Indiana Hoosiers
It has not been the strongest of starts on the hardwood this year for the Arizona Wildcats and fourth-year head coach Tommy Lloyd.
After getting out of the gate with a 2-0 record in their tune-up games, they dropped their third contest of the year, 103-88, to the Wisconsin Badgers, though that loss did come on the road.
A tough road loss offered no pity in the eyes of the poll voters, however, as the Wildcats fell out of the top 10 all the way to 17th in their latest rankings.
One player who could have helped Arizona in their matchup with the Badgers is center Oumar Ballo, the big man who transferred to the Indiana Hoosiers for his fifth collegiate season.
Ballo has started the year strong, helping the Hoosiers sit with a 3-0 record and a 16th-place-ranking in the polls.
Kerry Miller of Bleacher Report ranks the center highly among this season's transfer players with the former Wildcat landing at No. 3.
"Ballo only officially had two field-goal attempts in the convincing win over South Carolina this past weekend, but he finished that game with 13 rebounds, seven points and six blocks," writes Miller. "His newfound willingness to share the rock has been noteworthy, too. Ballo had a combined total of four assists over his final 12 games with the Wildcats, but he already has five dimes in three games with the Hoosiers—four of them coming on plays where he carved out a little room before setting up a teammate for a bucket at the rim."
After posting 12.9 points, 10.1 rebounds, 1.3 blocks, and 0.8 assists across 25.9 minutes in 26 games for Arizona last year, Ballo has upped his overall production to 13.0 points, 9.3 rebounds, 3.3 blocks, and 1.7 assists across 28.7 minutes in three games so far this year.
It is still early in the 2024-25 campaign, and those numbers could fall back to last season's marks, but his willingness to share the ball has begun to pay off in spades for Indiana.
"No one expects him to become a Nikola Jokić-level passing big," adds Miller, "but it's going to make this entire Indiana offense so much tougher to defend if he continues finding open teammates on a semi-regular basis."
The Hoosiers are perennially a program that calls for respect with what they have done on the court, and with a big man the caliber of Ballo this year, they may have what they need to make a deep run in the NCAA Tournament.
