Offseason in review: 

Last year was a relatively disappointing season, with the Norse falling into 7th place in the Horizon with a 11-9 conference record. The Norse lost in the quarterfinals of the Horizon League tournament and didn’t play further postseason ball. On top of losing Vinson and Robinson, Keeyan Itejere  transferred out of the program, moving to Rhode Island. 

One common theme Norse fans will remember from last year is the difficulty rebounding and struggling to score. The additions this year should help address both of those concerns. This team feels like a more athletic squad that will be able to compete well as a team. I fully expect this team to stay very similar to last year’s style, leaning on their defense and offense being a relative weakness. 

The Norse are picked 6th in the Horizon league preseason poll and Gherezgher received preseason honors of all-league second team after ending last season very effectively. 

NKU Scrimmages Ashland University in Dayton:

NKU’s first starting lineup was: 

0 Dan Gherezgher

5 LJ Wells

6 Ethan Elliott

8 Donovan Oday

24 Kael Robinson 

I would expect this to be the starting 5 to start the year. 

The first half was rocky to say the least. NKU started off hot with a solid post move and then a 3 from Oday. NKU then followed that up with a fast start on offense, but a very porous defense. 

NKU led at the first TV timeout 15-13, behind 11 from Oday. 

NKU then hit a bit of a slump while tinkering with different lineups. The Norse subbed in guys like Addison Archer (#1), Tae Dozier (#11) first, followed it up with bringing in Shawn Nelson (#3).  Continuing the barrage of subs, Donovan Rakotonanahary got some run as did Bryce Darbyshire and Juanma Ruiz. You can really tell that coach Horn wanted to see what he had in this team and did his best to rotate guys to figure it out. 

Ashland was a litte foul happy during the middle of the half, keeping NKU in the game from the FT line mainly. However, NKU dd have a 7+ minute drought during the 1H were they really let Ashland get ahead. The final 6 minutes of the half saw NKU pull away a bit mainly because Kael Robinson got assertive and had a stretch where he took over the game. 

Notable 1H stats and performances: 

NKU was led by Donovan Oday with 15, Kael Robinson had 10, and notably, Dan Gherezgher was held scoreless. LJ Wells ate on the glass, pulling down 9 rebounds. 

NKU shot 48% from the field and 55% from deep. They also went 14-20 from the FT line in the first.

The second half was mainly as expected. NKU had a really balanced scoring attacked by a great performances from Dozier (9), Wells (8), Gherezgher/Robinson (7 each), and Elliott (6).

NKU ended the game with 3 in double figures Robinson/Oday (17), and Dozier (16). LJ wells was an absolute BEAST on the glass tonight with 16 rebounds to lead the team and added 9 points.

As I hinted at on X, Ethan Elliott was the guy who really sparked this offense from a creativity standpoint, finishing with 9 points and 7 assists. The newcomer from Perth reallly thrived in transition and appeared to be fully in control of the offense.

The player who clearly impressed me the most was Donovan Oday, who had 17 points, but his overall game and athleticism really elevates this team. Outside of Dan and LJ, this team was almost exclusively unknown and I didn’t know how they were going to translate. It’s clear that Donovan will translate to the Horizon very well, and I expect Kael and Ethan to match that. The question becomes: Who else will step up from the group on the bench? I’ve been really impressed overall with Dozier, and I think that Nelson, while he played sparingly tonight, will be a solid option for some minutes off the bench. 

In the post-Exhibition presser, Coach Horn and Ethan Elliott provided some comments to the media.

Coach was happy with the aggressiveness of Donovan Oday, but urged him to be a better, more intense defender, saying he thinks he could be one of the best individual defenders since Coach Horn arrived in Highland Heights. He went on to add that he thinks this team can be a special defensive squad, but didn’t show it against Ashland. He was, however, happy with how NKU got to the FT line frequently and crashed the glass. He specifically praised LJ Wells and the pressure he’s placed on the senior this off season, wanting him to average double digit rebounds.

Ethan was asked to explain why he chose NKU, and his response was that the team immediately felt like a family and even though he was on Zoom from halfway across the world, he could tell this was the place for him. He also mentioned that it was very refreshing to get to play against other guys and really enjoyed playing in Dayton.

NKU out rebounded Ashland 39-32. 

Overall, I think the NKU roster this year has plenty of potential, and I’ll highlight more generalities/introductions in the text below. 

Roster Breakdown: 

Returning: 

Dan Gherezgher, wearing #0: He averaged 7.5 points, 2 rebounds and 2 assists per game last year. However, he averaged 16 points over the last 11 games last year. Dan will be tasked with taking on a much larger role with this years squad, and while he’ll need to prove it with consistency, he could end up as a first team all-conference guy. Dan played 21 minutes per game last year; expect to see him on the court 30+ minutes a night this year. 

LJ Wells, wearing #5:He averaged 7/5/1, however, he was very inconsistent when it came to performances. He had multiple games with either 0 or 2 points, but he also had 3 15+ point performances, and he added 3 double doubles on the year. With all of the departures this year, this team will rely on LJ to fortify the front court consistently if the Norse want to compete at the top of the Horizon. 

Donovan Rakotonanahary, wearing #10: Donovan redshirted last year, thus he is a bit of an unknown. Look for his 6’8” frame to be most impactful on defense and rebounding if he is able to carve out a consistent role.

Portal additions: 

NKU added 5 total transfers, 1 of which has D1 experience. 

Shawn Nelson (Barton College), wearing #3: Shawn averaged 19/5/5 last year at Barton, and will do a bit of everything for the Norse. Shawn will look to be a key rotational player off the bench this year.

Kael Robinson (Montana State), wearing #24: Robinson comes to NKU from Montana State. He averaged 17/7/3; he was first team all GNAC last year. He is going to fit in that mold of a versatile forward who can do a little bit of everything. I expect to see him starting and playing a lot of minutes this year. He stretches the floor and can run in transition.

Tae Dozier (Georgetown College (KY)), wearing #11: Tae averaged 12/7/3 and 2 steals and 2 blocks per game at NAIA Georgetown (KY). I see Dozier keeping the kind of do-it-all attitude he clearly had down I-75. He’s going to be all over the floor this year and fits the NKU mold for long guards who do multiple things very well. 

Donovan Oday (Cal State Fullerton), wearing #8, Oday averaged 13/5 per game las year, both leading Cal State Fullerton. While only 6’2”, he will absolutely help fill the rebounding void from last year, and will provide a great presence on defense. Being able to add a guy like Oday onto this NKU roster was crucial for this offseason. Early feedback suggest he’ll be a major factor disrupting on defense, but his athleticism and shot making will be crucial this year. 

Addison Archer (Ranger College), wearing #12: Archer is a great athlete that immediately raises the athleticism floor of this squad overall. He is an extremely versatile big who shot at an 84% clip from the FT line. I want to see how he does against D1 competition from a physicality stance before fully buying in. He did struggle at times in the preseason exhibition.

Freshmen:

Juan Manuel Ruiz Jodar (Spain), wearing #17: Juan looks to become a truly disruptive presence on defense, however, he is likely to be more of a developmental piece needing some time before being ready. 

Ryan Tolliver will be wearing #1. I expect Ryan to mainly use this year to develop, but he is a very promising piece for the Norse future! 

JJ Apathjang, wearing #22 : While i’ve heard generally good things about JJ since his arrival, I think he is the 3rd PG on this squad and likely uses his freshman year to adapt up and develop. 

Ethan Elliot (Australia), wearing #6: While Ethan is a freshman, that is really only in name. Ethan spent 2 years in Australia’s NBL semi-pro league. He is primarily a ballahndler who loves the pick and roll game. When playing off the ball, he’ll also look to be in position to shoot. Finally, look for Elliot to lead the transition break as often as possible. 

Overall, this team is a little bit tough to predict overall, and I feel like the preseason Horizon League poll having NKU 6 is about right. I expect this team to struggle some against the top of the Horizon, but there are several teams who should be worse than them in the league. 

Looking ahead, if we’re talking about NKU making it to Indianapolis for the HL semis, LJ Wells will have morphed into an amazing leader and improved his efficiency, Dan has taken a big leap ahead, and guys like Oday, Nelson, Dozier, and Robinson have transitioned into Highland Heights very well. 

The clear most important player is Dan Gherezgher, who will clearly be relied on to carry the offense. From a leadership stance, I am very curious to see if Dan or LJ step up as the vocal presence. For now, I have heard that LJ is the vocal leader this year. However, after the exhibition, Elliott and Rbinson are also potential candidates to play the vocal leader role at times this year.

Projecting the Starting Lineup: 

Coach Horn and co. aren’t afraid of messing with lineups, and I haven’t been inside the program enough to give a fully educated projection, however, based off of my initial review, my thoughts would be: 

• Dan Gherezgher
• Donovan Oday
• Ethan Elliott
• LJ Wells
• Kael Robinson 

6th Man: Tae Dozier

Analytical Projections and returning production: 

Of the 6700 minutes possible from last year, NKU returns 1373 which is good for 8th place in the Horizon League. NKU is only returning 14.5 points per game from last year’s squad who averaged 71.8 ppg. They also only return 7.1 rebounds (of 33.6), and 2.9 assists (from 14.2). I think that this highlights the bigger concern with this squad. It is practically a completely new roster and they need to find roughly 60ppg to be competitive. I don’t necessarily see this roster being clearly better than last year’s. I think this team will be best served forcing turnovers and creating offense from their defense. If not, this team will likely struggle on the offensive side of the ball. I do, however very much so expect this team to do be better on the defensive side of the ball just from a pure athleticism standpoint. 

Analytical surface Dive: 

I know not everyone is a fan of the analytics side of college basketball, however, it does play a crucial role in being able to fairly evaluate all NCAA D1 teams. 

For a baseline, I’m going to provide stats from kenpom.com and barttorvik.com as those are the two predictive models that the NCAA recognizes on their team sheets. 

	2023/24	2024/25	2025/26 (Projected)
kenpom.com OVR	186	230	281
kenpom.com adjOE	233	242	280
kenpom.com adjDE	163	203	261
barttorvik.com OVR	195	239	293
barttorvik.com adjOE	238	236	309
barttorvik.com adjDE	160	235	293

ADJ OE = Adjusted offensive efficiency; this is a metric measuring teams scoring per 100 possessions, adjusted for quality of opponents defense. 

ADJ DE = Adjusted defensive efficiency; this is a metric measuring teams defensive performance by estimating the number of points they would allow per 100 possessions against an average offense. 

Now that we’ve dove into a some key metrics, why does it matter? Why do I include it here? Again, I completely understand that especially in low-major basketball, it can be relatively meaningless. However, it is a great predictor to how a team is going to perform over the year. Is it perfect? No. However, I think it helps put the team into perspective a bit as we head into the year. This year’s team is clearly the worst of the three from an analytical standpoint, and will be coming into the year as underdogs relatively frequently throughout the year. 

Let’s look at the rest of the Horizon League, organized by kenpom.com rankings. 

Team	kenpom.com Projected OVR rank:	barttorvik.com projected OVR rank:
Youngstown	171	207
Wright State	193	224
Oakland	195	235
Milwaukee	212	243
Purdue Ft. Wayne	213	201
Robert Morris	221	198
Cleveland State	253	240
NKU	281	293
Detroit	298	301
Green Bay	326	256
IU Indy	355	361

kenpom.com projects NKU to have a losing season at 15-16 (9-11).

barttorvik.com projects NKU to have the same record. 

Non-Conference Slate: 

11/3: vs. Cincy Clermont – NKU should win vs. a Non-D1 opponent

11/8: @ Tennessee – NKU will likely lose by 25+ in this buy game

11/12: @ East Tennessee St – This is an intriguing one. I’ll admit I don’t know much about ETST this year, but I’ll go with ETSU to win this one. However, if NKU is going to play above preseason expectations, this is winnable. 

11/16: vs. Cumberlands – NKU should win vs. a Non-D1 opponent

11/20: @ Central Michigan – This is a bit of a toss-up. I’ll take CMU to win this one. 

11/24: vs. Eastern Kentucky – I love that this game is taking place. Eastern is normally a solid squad every year. I’ll take  NKU to win in a close one. 

11/26: vs. Wofford – I believe that NKU beats the Terriers at home

11/29: vs. Boston U – NKU gets another win at home

12/09: vs. Brescia – NKU should in vs. a non-D1 Opponent

12/13: @ Bellarmine – NKU will likely fall to the Knights on the road. 

12/21: vs. Charleston – Chris Mack and the Cougars are coming to Highland Heights! This is a really cool game that NKU was able to get to coordinate. I’ll take Charleston here though. 

Projected Non-Conference record: 9-5 – This is likely an optimistic take, as NKU is going to be underdogs against several of these opponents throughout the non-conference slate. 

Also note, there are three Horizon League games mixed into the NC slate, with NKU hosting Cleveland St on 12/3, going to Purdue Ft. Wayne on 12/6 and hosting Oakland on 12/17. I will have a full conference breakdown as we near December, and the start of the Horizon League slate! For now, I’ll take NKU to finish at 10-10 in Horizon League play, bringing their record to 20-14. Putting out a 20-14 projection feels like journalism malpractice here, but I really do feel like this team’s schedule sets up nicely for them to stack up wins in the NC part of the schedule before heading into the rugged Horizon league. 

Looking at the stretch that will define the first half of the season is pretty clear: How NKU performs starting 11/24 and culminating with the Horizon opener on 12/03 in those 4 home games really will define the slate. If NKU were to go 2-2 in that slate, it would be a bit disappointing, but almost the expected outcome. If that is the case, expect NKU to finish closer to 14/15 wins on the year. 

Within the schedule preview, I have spelled the best and worst cases out here. Best case, NKU gets to 9/10 NC wins and pushes for 20 total wins on the year. Worst case, NKU wins 5/6 NC games (including 3 vs. Non-D1 competition), and finishes closer to the projected 15 win total. 

This season in Highland Heights is one that has more questions coming into the year than any year I can remember since starting to follow the program in 16/17. I am very curious to see how the transfer portal additions are able to jump up from the lower ranks to the Horizon League. I’m also extremely intrigued to see who really steps up as the vocal leader this year. All signs point to LJ Wells, but does another leader emerge?