Tommy Lloyd set an impossibly high bar for first-year college basketball coaches everywhere last season as he guided Arizona to a Pac-12 regular-season championship, Pac-12 Tournament title and a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. If Year Two under the former long-time Gonzaga assistant is to be similarly fruitful, it will require the Wildcats to replace three of the top 33 picks from June’s NBA Draft.
Gone are Bennedict Mathurin (Pac-12 Player of the Year), Christian Koloko (Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year and Most Improved Player) and super utility man Dalen Terry, who used a late surge up draft boards to be selected No. 18 overall by the Bulls. While that’s a daunting trio to lose, the Wildcats may wind up as the preseason favorite to win the Pac-12 again thanks to the remaining pieces from a rotation that was among the nation’s deepest.
With a trio of international stars back after playing key roles last season in Kerr Kriisa, Pelle Larsson and Azuolas Tubelis, Arizona has a solid base from which to build. From there, the ceiling for the Wildcats may be determined by the player development chops of Lloyd and his staff as players like Adama Bal and Oumar Ballo seek leaps in productivity. Lloyd won Pac-12 Coach of the Year last season, and if he can lead the Wildcats back to a favorable NCAA Tournament seeding, it should validate his ability to doubters who believe the fast start to his head coaching career is merely the byproduct of the excellent roster he inherited from Sean Miller.
As the 2022-23 college basketball season creeps nearer, here’s a glimpse at how Arizona’s starting lineup and rotation could shape up.
Projected starting lineup
1. Kerr Kriisa
6-3 | 180 | Jr.
The boisterous, headband-wearing point guard was second in the Pac-12 in assists per game last season with 4.7 and is Arizona’s second-leading returning scorer behind Azuolas Tubelis. Kriisa closed the season shooting just 33.6% from 3-point range, but his 2-for-17 shooting performance while playing through an ankle injury in two NCAA Tournament games drove down his percentage at the end. Kriisa is a battery pack of emotion and a critical leader for the Wildcats who could take a step forward this season.
2. Courtney Ramey
6-3 | 185 | Redshirt Sr.
After logging 128 appearances, including 106 starts, over four seasons at Texas, Ramey is stepping in at Arizona to help replace the production of Mathurin…
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