With the recent announcement that Duncan Powell would be forgoing his senior season to enter the NBA Draft, Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets head coach Damon Stoudamire may have to use incoming star freshman Mouhamed Sylla sooner than expected.
The hole left in the starting lineup with the departure of Powell and waiting to see if senior Luke O'Brien will be eligible for another season has raised question around what exactly the Yellow Jackets plan to do for their frontcourt next season. We already know that Baye Ndongo will take up one of the spots, if he chooses to stay with the Yellow Jackets, but the other spot is not taken quite yet.
Stoudamire would of course love if O'Brien were able to get one more year, as he averaged 6.4 points and 4.6 rebounds per game last season in the ten games that he played in before going down with what would wind up being a season-ending injury.
Here is where Sylla comes in to play in all of this. If O'brien is not able to play, then I feel that the Yellow Jackets for sure use him as at least a sixth man off the bench, but that may not be something ideal for Stoudamire. Sylla could not be ready to play that role quite yet, and it could mean that a lot is expected from Sylla from the minute he steps on campus, which could be a good thing for both parties, or something disastrous waiting to happen.