SEATTLE _ The University of Washington men’s basketball team has already endured losing senior Scott Suggs for the season and sophomore C.J. Wilcox for three games, and now the Huskies might have to play without another key player for Saturday night’s game against USC.
Leading scorer Tony Wroten Jr. was still hobbled by a thigh contusion Friday, and as of mid-afternoon coach Lorenzo Romar was not certain whether he would be able to play Saturday.
“Tony’s a warrior, and I feel like he’ll play,” Romar said of his best guess as to whether the star freshman would be on the floor for the USC game. “But I haven’t heard an official word yet. I don’t know.”
Wroten said about an hour after Thursday night’s win over UCLA that he was “50-50” for the game. He underwent a CAT scan that revealed severe swelling in his right thigh, Wroten said at the time.
Wroten sat out the final 8½ minutes of Thursday’s game, watching from the bench while the Huskies came all the way back from a 10-point deficit. While Wroten said it was difficult to sit and watch, he led the post-game celebration and said afterward that he understood why Romar left him on the bench.
“I was not mad at all that I wasn’t in,” Wroten said late Thursday night. “I was just glad that we got a win. … It’s not about me; it’s about this team.”
On Friday afternoon, Romar didn’t want to think about the possibility of not having Wroten for Saturday’s game, but he knows it would be a difficult loss to overcome.
“It’s different, definitely,” he said of not having Wroten on the floor. “He kind of sometimes just wills himself on the other team.”
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