SEATTLE — What became abundantly clear in the early stages of the University of Washington men’s basketball team’s non-conference schedule was that this would not be one of Lorenzo Romar’s deeper teams.
A couple of stress fractures already have whittled away whatever bench the Huskies hoped to have.
A little more than a month after senior Scott Suggs decided to redshirt because of a stress fracture in his foot, sophomore teammate C.J. Wilcox is out indefinitely with a similar injury to his femur. And for the time being, coach Lorenzo Romar isn’t quite sure whether his team is deep enough to stay afloat.
“I hope so,” he said when asked whether the Huskies currently have enough depth to compete in the Pacific-12 Conference.
Wilcox is not expected to play against Stanford and Cal this week and is scheduled to undergo another X-ray next week to determine his status for an Arizona road trip. While he is out, the Huskies are left with just six reserves who average more than 2.0 points per game.
Hikeem Stewart, a freshman guard from Rainier Beach High School, was forced into extended action in Sunday’s win over Washington State but didn’t take a single shot in 10 minutes of action. Freshmen big men Shawn Kemp Jr. and Martin Breunig have become bit players in UW’s rotation.
For the most part, the Huskies will continue to rely on their starting five and starter-turned-reserve Darnell Gant.
“That’s tough because some of us have to play 30, 35 minutes,” starting guard Abdul Gaddy said. “It’s tough, but it’s all about mental toughness. I love playing 30-something minutes a game. I don’t want to ever come out, so I’ll take advantage of it.”
Even before Wilcox got hurt, the Huskies only went about seven deep in their rotation. Suggs’ injury and some slow development by freshmen like Breunig, Kemp and Stewart have left UW with very few options off the bench.
The Huskies opened the season with Tony Wroten Jr. and Desmond Simmons as their top two reserves, but both have since moved into the starting lineup. Wilcox gave UW a boost off the bench after Wroten replaced him as a starter, but he won’t be part of the rotation this week.
A problematic hip that has bothered him for about a month finally became unbearable during last week’s game against Seattle University. While Wilcox was able to score a career-high 25 points in that game, he said Tuesday that he felt like he was playing the game on one leg.
“It was painful,” said Wilcox, who ranks second on the team in scoring at 15.5 points per game.
Wilcox said the injury has become less painful in recent days but added that he doesn’t want to risk further damage.
“Right now I feel fine, but I worry about potentially breaking it and not being able to play again,” he said. “So it’s really more of a safety thing.”
In the meantime, Wilcox can only sit and watch his six-deep team try to gut it out without him.
“It’s a pretty important part of the season to be sitting out,” he said. “It’s pretty frustrating. But as long as the team’s winning, I’m just going to try to do what I can do to contribute to the team.”
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