The 2018-19 Miami basketball team is one in transition. They will have a few new key players in the rotation. The schedule this season benefits a good start at the beginning of the non-conference and ACC schedule.
Bruce Brown, Ja’Quan Newton and Lonnie Walker will be replaced by Zach Johnson, Miles Wilson and Anthony Mack. The Miami basketball team also returns key players Dewan Huell, Chris Lykes, and Anthony Lawrence. Those three are the Hurricanes only returning starters
The ACC announced the conference schedule last week. The Miami basketball team began their ACC Schedule with road games at Pittsburgh and Georgia Tech last season. That created a month away from the Watsco Center. This season Miami will be home for over a month.
After playing a road game at Pennsylvania December 4 the Hurricanes don’t play away from home until they play at Louisville on January 6. That is followed by a trip to Tallahassee to play Florida State. The Hurricanes then play four of their next five at home. That will give Jim Larranaga and his staff nearly two months of practice time.
Busting Brackets
Although the Hurricanes didn’t sign any players out of high school the transfers that will play this season give Miami experience in big games. Both Johnson and Wilson played in the NCAA Tournament at their former schools.
In his column yesterday in the Miami Herald, Barry Jackson said one of the Miami basketball staff members told him that “Johnson is an excellent shooter and has displayed toughness” in early practices.
Johnson is a graduate transfer from Florida Gulf Coast and Wilson is a Redshirt Sophomore after sitting out last season following his transfer from Mount St. Mary’s. One or both of them is likely to start. The extra days in practice instead of all the traveling the Hurricanes did last season should help them grow.
Jackson also discussed who the potential starting lineup could be for the Miami basketball team. His projection was that the four sure starters are “Dewan Huell, Chris Lykes, Anthony Lawrence and DJ Vasiljevic.”
It would be surprising for Vasiljevic to be a starter. Lawrence started 31 games last year. Expect Lawrence to continue to remain a starter.
Johnson and Wilson did not transfer to Miami to come off the bench. Seven different Miami basketball players started a game last season. Vasiljevic started 20. A lot of that came in the first half of the season.
Vasiljevic started the first 14 games of 2017-18. He started with Lonnie Walker still working his way back from offseason surgery on his MCL. Vasiljevic then started the first six games after the Hurricanes lost Bruce Brown for the season. Lykes replaced Vasiljevic and started the final seven games of the season.
Johnson and Wilson are high volume scorers who are the most adept players to replace Brown and Walker. Although not the talents of the first two Hurricanes selected in the same modern NBA Draft, Johnson and Wilson should be able to make up for the production lost with Brown and Walker’s departures.