What Frank Anselem-Ibe Brings to Louisville

Here's what the transfer from Georgia brings to the table for the Cardinals.

Georgia center and Louisville transfer commit Frank Anselem-Ibe / University of Louisville Athletics

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - At this point in the roster construction stage, new Louisville men's basketball head coach Pat Kelsey and his staff have been focusing on bolstering the Cardinals' front court with their last open scholarship. On late Tuesday night, they were able to find the final piece to the 2024-25 puzzle.

Frank Anselem-Ibe, who spent the last two seasons of his career at Georgia, is heading to the Louisville to wrap his collegiate career with the Cards. He is the 12th transfer commitment for Kelsey since his hiring on Mar. 28, and the 13th commitment overall - officially filling out every scholarship for next season's roster.

The 6-foot-10, 215-pound big man played in 29 of Georgia's 37 games this past season, while also making three starts. In that time, he averaged 2.6 points, 2.1 rebounds and 0.7 blocks per game, while shooting 62.8 percent from the field.

Anselem-Ibe's play increased during Georgia's NIT run. He averaged 5.5 points and 6.3 rebounds on 62.5 percent shooting in four games, including a 10-point and 10-rebound double-double against Ohio State. The Bulldogs fell to eventual NIT champion Seton Hall in the semifinals.

The native of Lagos, Nigeria started his career at Syracuse, spending two seasons there before playing the next two seasons at Georgia. In 96 appearances and 15 starts between his time with the Orange and Bulldogs, Anselem-Ibe has totaled 254 points, 290 rebounds, 59 blocks and 30 assists.

But beyond his stat lines, what else does Anselem-Ibe bring to the table for the Cardinals?

As you can imagine from a true center who is nearly seven-feet tall, Anselem-Ibe lives almost exclusively in the paint. 92 percent of his field goal attempts last season came right at the rim, with the overwhelming majority of his shots come from the elbow, the low post or the dunker's spot on the baseline.

At first glance, Anselem-Ibe is a little bit on the wiry/lean side, but he's stronger than he appears. Against heavy traffic down low, he does a good job at finishing through contact, and also just holding onto the ball against double teams. He made 61 percent of his attempts right at the rim, and committed just eight turnovers on the entire season. It helps that he does a very good job of utilizing his pivot foot on post moves both on the block and close to the elbow in transition, and is a lot more fleet of foot than you would expect.

Building off of that last sentence, while it's not a major aspect of his game, Anselem-Ibe is a very underrated scorer as a cutter. It's a small sample size, but he averaged a whopping 2.2 points per possession on cuts, which was in the 99th percentile in college basketball last season.

What is a big aspect of Anselem-Ibe's game is on put backs. He's not only good at grabbing his own misses thanks to both his height/length, but he shows a willingness to fight through contact to grab missed shots from his teammates. As a result, he shines as an offensive rebounder, putting up a 11.3 percent offensive rebounding rate, and scoring 1.27 point per possession on put backs.

Something that Anselem-Ibe does have to clean up a bit is his tendency to put the ball on the floor almost every time he gets the ball - whether that be off a pass or a put back. That's fine whenever he's got an open look or no one else around him, but whenever tight defense is being played on him or he's facing a double team, that could result in an easy turnover against some of the better front courts in the ACC.

On the defensive end of the court, Anselem-Ibe is the very definition of a rim protector. He's a fantastic shot blocker, putting up a 7.9 percent block rate and averaging 3.0 blocks per 40 minutes. He's overwhelming in one-on-one low post matchups, but can also adjust to the ball very well in 2-on-1 disadvantages. He's great as a help side defender, and will even sometimes stretch out the perimeter if he has to.

So why didn't he put up better numbers at Georgia last season? Well, they didn't use him hardly at all. He played in just 17.7 percent of the Bulldogs' total minutes, which ranks all the way down at 707th amongst the 1,067 power conference players.

In fact, Anselem-Ibe was one of only nine D1 players last season that posted an offensive rating of over 126.0 and a block percentage of over 7.5 percent in at least 15 percent of minutes played. This list includes players like UConn's Donovan Clingan, Creighton's Ryan Kalkbrenner, New Mexico's J.T. Toppin, and... Charleston's James Scott, who is now at Louisville.

Overall, this a great front court depth piece for Louisville. Anselem-Ibe likely won't be asked to do a ton, but he provides the Cardinals with another rim protector, as well as another option at the five for bigger lineups.

(Photo of Frank Anselem-Ibe via University of Louisville Athletics)

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