Robert Morris looks to Nikolaos Chitikoudis to become next great Colonial big man

Many things went right for Robert Morris Basketball this past season. The team won the Horizon League regular season and conference tournament titles en route to playing in the NCAA Tournament for the first time in a decade. 

The Colonials' big reason for being so good was that they had the best frontcourt in the Horizon League. They were led by Horizon League Player of the Year forward Alvaro Folguerias and Defensive Player of the Year forward Amarion Dickerson. Both are now at Iowa and USC, respectively, while backup center Ismael Plet exhausted his eligibility. 

With guard/wing Ryan Prather being the lone returning player, the Colonials are tasked with landing a bunch of new faces. The first few players came from the perimeter, but their first D-I transfer was a “big” one in Nikolaos Chitikoudis, a 6’6 forward/center from Greece. 

Chitikoudis played at North Carolina A&T for the past two seasons, starting 41 total games. This past season, the forward produced 10.8 ppg and 9.3 rpg, shooting 54% from the field. He was in the top 20 nationally on the boards, leading all of the CAA in that category. Some of Chitikoudis top games included eight points and 22 rebounds against NC Central, along with 19 points and 15 rebounds versus Northeastern.

Even when Robert Morris wasn’t winning much in the Horizon League, Coach Andy Toole and the program have consistently had good frontcourt players. That includes Kahliel Spear and Markeese Hastings, who were the more recent examples before Folguerias and Dickerson broke out this past season.

Having Chitikoudis is a good pickup for the Colonials' frontcourt,, but they still need to add some more pieces. With so much demand, it’s hard to find more quality bigs in the portal, so look for the potential D-2 and JUCO areas to be a place where they try to add to Chitikoudis.