Current State of the Boise State Basketball Roster

If you have a Twitter account or read this site at all, you should know that the Boise State Men's Basketball roster had a bit of a shake-up over the past couple of days. First, Class of 2014 recruits Kevin Allen and Zach Haney officially signed National Letters of Intent to play basketball for the Broncos. What this did was put Coach Rice's squad one scholarship over the allowable NCAA limit—someone had to go. Unfortunately, that meant Edmunds Dukulis and Joey Nebeker were informed that their scholarships were not being renewed. As it stands, this is how the Boise State roster shapes up for years to come:

When the addition of Haney was announced, I figured Dukulis would be the most logical subtraction from the team considering Allen, Wacker, and Haney all play a 4 or a 5 (Dukulis' position) and all stand at least two (but more likely four) inches taller than the Latvian Lifeguard (we didn't have time to come up with a better nickname).

The subtraction of Nebeker, however, is peculiar. But, I can see it from both sides of the issue. It is unfortunate that Nebeker couldn't ascend to being the hero of the Boise State program. Being a small-town Idaho kid, that dream is something I can relate to. From my perspective, Nebeker seemed like he was safe because he played a different position than three of the four recruits. With him leaving, one scholarship is now available for the Class of 2014 relating back to one of three reasons:

1. The coaches still believe they will sign one more recruit to this class
2. The coaches will use the extra slot to add more depth in the Class of 2015
3. Coach Rice was truly looking out for Nebeker and wanted the best for his playing career. If Rice legitimately didn't see any playing time for this kid at Boise State, it makes sense for him to use the scholarship on another player while also letting Nebeker play legitimate minutes at another institution

My best guess.... Option 2. With four seniors graduating, the coaches will need to make some big time additions to offset the loss of talent. If that's the case, I agree with it, BUT I still would have kept Nebeker. They had room for him and I still believe he had potential to make an impact.

Haney is an upgrade over Dukulis but will most certainly redshirt and looks a lot like a project. Not a bad project, just a project. Ryan Watkins was a project until mid-way through his junior year. And before you go questioning my evaluation skills of project centers, take into account I was a Sonics (R.I.P.) fan who saw the team draft Robert Swift, Johan Petro, and Saer Sene in the first round in consecutive years.