Big Ten Basketball: Breakout candidate from each team for 2020-21 season

Ohio State: EJ Liddell

Ohio State Basketball will be going with Kaleb Wesson at the center position in 2020-21. The 6’9 270 pound Wesson has shed some weight since coming in as a freshman and performed well as a junior averaging 14 points and nine rebounds. This is significant when you factor in Kyle Young returning as a senior to play forward at 6’8 who grabbed almost six rebounds last season. These two players are going to allow an opportunity for undersized 6’6 power forward E.J Liddell to log more than his almost 17 minutes per game.

The addition of transfer Seth Towns to the Buckeyes will prevent Liddell from starting, but the transfer losses of guard D.J Carlton who ate up 24 minutes per game and guard Luther Muhammad who logged 25 minutes is going to force coach Chris Holtmann to use the forwards he has as swingmen at times.

Whether it was at Butler or Ohio State, coach Holtmann loves to get his team running and scoring in transition  Coming out of Belleville West High School Liddell was ranked 41st, one behind LaMelo Ball and more impressively two ahead of Kofi Cockburn of Illinois. Liddell is an effort guy that fits nicely into a transition offense, especially since he can start the transition, by blocking two shots shy of the team lead, despite playing 401 minutes less than Kaleb Wesson.

Liddell will not be starting, but he will average more than 17 minutes per game off the bench. With the increased minutes and the larger offensive role with fewer starters on the court, he will also see an uptick in his 22 percent usage rate. Look for his scoring average, that was south of seven points, to get to double digits and rebounds to improve by two or three, as he will prove he is one more year away from an All-Big Ten second team.