Oskar Giltay Stanford Center possible transfer?

[Jbirdp5]

It seems to me that the staff sees some elite traits in this kid with defense and rebounding and thinks through development they can pull the rest out of him. Seems like a good gamble when they have who they perceive to be their starter already

 

[aceboon]

Can't remember the name of it but Hurley uses an analytics service to evaluate possible portal targets, Schertz is also heavy on analytics. If both are after Giltay I'll trust their judgement

 

[DogMania]

I'm assuming he's more a depth piece and that they will still look to add a longer and more athletic 5/4 combo.

If that's not the case, I'm a little concerned, wondering if they have enough NIL money to compete with other programs looking to fill the same need. There's also the challenge of trying to convince that type of player to come here where there might be other programs that have more playing time and/or an open starting position to offer.

I think the key is trying to find players that see the opportunity to win a championship and being developed has greater value than seeking the top NIL dollar and a more guaranteed starting opportunity.

It's really hard to blame any player who enters the portal who's not sure they can make a lot of money at the next level, and sees their opportunity to maximize their earnings now. I have no idea what kind of money some programs are throwing at some of these players as their options to fill roster needs start to dry up.

 

[upstater]

I'm assuming he's more a depth piece and that they will still look to add a longer and more athletic 5/4 combo.

If that's not the case, I'm a little concerned, wondering if they have enough NIL money to compete with other programs looking to fill the same need. There's also the challenge of trying to convince that type of player to come here where there might be other programs that have more playing time and/or an open starting position to offer.

I think the key is trying to find players that see the opportunity to win a championship and being developed has greater value than seeking the top NIL dollar and a more guaranteed starting opportunity.

It's really hard to blame any player who enters the portal who's not sure they can make a lot of money at the next level, and sees their opportunity to maximize their earnings now. I have no idea what kind of money some programs are throwing at some of these players as their options to fill roster needs start to dry up.

He would definitely be the backup center. I can't see him doing any outside scoring to play the 4 for us.

 

[Hungryhusky99]

The past 4 seasons we went with at center-

'23- 6'9 245 lb 7'2.75 wingspan and a 7'2 barefoot dominant defensive player as his backup.

'24- 7'2 dominant center and a 6'10 7'5 wingspan as his backup.

'25- 6'11 7'5 wingspan, 6'10 7'5 wingspan splitting time equally at center.

'26- 6'11 7'5 wingspan, 7'1 (not really that tall) as his backup.

'27- so far 6'10 7'1.5 wingspan

The other top teams in college basketball are going bigger and some are trying to rationalize us going a lot smaller than we have any year in our 4 year run. Makes no sense.

Dude is just making up wingspans to fit his narratives lmao

 

[BGesus4]

A bit short. Probably an inch shorter than Tarris and 3.5 inch shorter wingspan. He certainly has the physical strength, size in chest/shoulders and huge hands. The point is we have to get a legit 7'0 foot center to share minutes with him, capable of giving us 15 very good minutes per game.

Reed is also a freak athlete for his size. We can’t expect to have that be replicated.

I have to agree with your overall assessment. This team is missing size and probably a dynamic, long 4 away from being a clear title contender. The current lineup is relying on some real outperformance of expectations at a couple spots to be in the tier with Florida, Michigan, Duke, etc

 

[444JR]

 

[444JR]

 

[uconn_jack]

Thanks for these. Quicker than I expected with good timing. I can see the potential.

 

[HooperScooper]

Can't remember the name of it but Hurley uses an analytics service to evaluate possible portal targets, Schertz is also heavy on analytics. If both are after Giltay I'll trust their judgement

HD Intelligence

HD Intelligence

www.hdintelligence.com

 

[Scrutineer]

The bottom line to me is if Mullins, Khamenia, Demary, and Hines are as good as we think, Ross or Landrew play well, and County, Junior Ross, and others we bring in play adequately, we're loaded and too focused on having two starting level players at each position. When has that ever been the case besides 2024?

There's always a lot of comments here about "in Hurley we trust", "we don't know what the coaches know", "Hurley is the best coach in the game" yet, for example, here we are getting nervous about who will be brought in as the backup center.

Reading all the comments about what we need and how many holes there are in every players' game is hilarious when you look at the box score for the 1999 Championship game (posted below but hard to read because the column headings don't align with the numbers).

We won the National Championship by defeating "the greatest team in the history of basketball", a team so loaded many were gushing how Duke's second team could probably win it, yet:
-our starting center played 28 minutes and had 2 points and 3 rebounds;.
-backup center played 8 minutes and had 4 points and 0 rebounds; so we had a
-total of 6 points and 3 rebounds from our center position in the National Championship game.

Should anyone think that was a fluke win, we were 34-2 that year and Jake averaged 5.5 points and 6.4 rebounds for the year, his junior year, playing 21.4 minutes per game.

For a comparison with Hines, Jake averaged 4.0 points and 5.5 rebounds in 20.5 minutes his freshman year, while Hines averaged 6.5 points and 5.5 rebounds in 18.0 minutes his freshman year. Tarris Reed averaged 3.4 points and 3.9 rebounds in 12.6 minutes his freshman year and Emeka Okafor averaged 7.9 points and 9.0 rebounds in 30.0 minutes his freshman year.

Oscar Giltay averaged 3.3 points and 4.1 rebounds in 14.6 minutes.......so maybe he or Machot or one of the other guys we're linked to will be better than some think.

Connecticut (34-2)​

	Basic Box Score Stats
Starters	MP	FG	FGA	FG%	2P	2PA	2P%	3P	3PA	3P%	FT	FTA	FT%	ORB	DRB	TRB	AST	STL	BLK	TOV	PF	PTS
Richard Hamilton	38	10	22	.455	8	18	.444	2	4	.500	5	6	.833	4	3	7	3	2	0	0	1	27
Ricky Moore	37	6	10	.600	5	9	.556	1	1	1.000	0	1	.000	0	8	8	2	1	0	3	4	13
Kevin Freeman	32	3	6	.500	3	6	.500	0	0		0	0		5	3	8	0	0	3	3	1	6
Jake Voskuhl	28	1	1	1.000	1	1	1.000	0	0		0	0		0	3	3	2	0	2	0	3	2
Khalid El-Amin	22	5	12	.417	5	10	.500	0	2	.000	2	4	.500	3	1	4	4	0	0	6	3	12
Reserves	MP	FG	FGA	FG%	2P	2PA	2P%	3P	3PA	3P%	FT	FTA	FT%	ORB	DRB	TRB	AST	STL	BLK	TOV	PF	PTS
Albert Mouring	17	3	4	.750	3	3	1.000	0	1	.000	0	1	.000	0	3	3	0	0	1	2	1	6
Edmund Saunders	11	1	3	.333	1	3	.333	0	0		2	4	.500	0	3	3	0	0	0	1	3	4
Souleymane Wane	8	2	2	1.000	2	2	1.000	0	0		0	0		0	0	0	0	1	0	0	4	4
Rashamel Jones	6	1	1	1.000	1	1	1.000	0	0		1	2	.500	0	2	2	0	0	0	1	0	3
Antric Klaiber	1	0	0		0	0		0	0		0	0		0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
School Totals	200	32	61	.525	29	53	.547	3	8	.375	10	18	.556	12	26	38	11	4	6	16	20	77

​

 

[superjohn]

Dude is just making up wingspans to fit his narratives lmao

Feel free to give me their wingspans and make corrections.

You won't be able to.

 

[boog204]

Of course, I'd rather have a 7-2 monster. But those cats aren't exactly around or available. This dude is not particularly exciting, but could he give you 4 and 4 with good defense in 13-14 minutes/gm? Probably. I like that he's played in the ACC and was modestly productive in his minutes. I like Euro bigs because (stereotypically) they know how to play. The advanced metrics cite him as an "elite" rebounder and defender?

I mentioned the Jake vibes because his offensive numbers were always pedestrian. But he set ridiculous screens, played insanely tough D, and was a rock.

The Charleston kid is a much more enticing highlight package, but I wonder if he'd broken in half trying to play in the BE, and a very underrated aspect imo, does he have the physicality to screen the way our 5s need to? Our offense, motion, and action rely on our 5s to be screening all over the place. Hell, in some of our sets, the 5s only job is to screen for 25 seconds.

This year's team is set up to be almost completely perimeter-oriented. We're banking on getting high teens from Braylon, low teens from Silas and Khamenia, and Ross and Landrew being productive scorers. We need our 5s to rebound, screen, dunk what's provided to them, and play killer D. Anything more from them is golden.

 

[superjohn]

The bottom line to me is if Mullins, Khamenia, Demary, and Hines are as good as we think, Ross or Landrew play well, and County, Junior Ross, and others we bring in play adequately, we're loaded and too focused on having two starting level players at each position. When has that ever been the case besides 2024?

There's always a lot of comments here about "in Hurley we trust", "we don't know what the coaches know", "Hurley is the best coach in the game" yet, for example, here we are getting nervous about who will be brought in as the backup center.

Reading all the comments about what we need and how many holes there are in every players' game is hilarious when you look at the box score for the 1999 Championship game (posted below but hard to read because the column headings don't align with the numbers).

We won the National Championship by defeating "the greatest team in the history of basketball", a team so loaded many were gushing how Duke's second team could probably win it, yet:
-our starting center played 28 minutes and had 2 points and 3 rebounds;.
-backup center played 8 minutes and had 4 points and 0 rebounds; so we had a
-total of 6 points and 3 rebounds from our center position in the National Championship game.

Should anyone think that was a fluke win, we were 34-2 that year and Jake averaged 5.5 points and 6.4 rebounds for the year, his junior year, playing 21.4 minutes per game.

For a comparison with Hines, Jake averaged 4.0 points and 5.5 rebounds in 20.5 minutes his freshman year, while Hines averaged 6.5 points and 5.5 rebounds in 18.0 minutes his freshman year. Tarris Reed averaged 3.4 points and 3.9 rebounds in 12.6 minutes his freshman year and Emeka Okafor averaged 7.9 points and 9.0 rebounds in 30.0 minutes his freshman year.

Oscar Giltay averaged 3.3 points and 4.1 rebounds in 14.6 minutes.......so maybe he or Machot or one of the other guys we're linked to will be better than some think.

Connecticut (34-2)​

	Basic Box Score Stats
Starters	MP	FG	FGA	FG%	2P	2PA	2P%	3P	3PA	3P%	FT	FTA	FT%	ORB	DRB	TRB	AST	STL	BLK	TOV	PF	PTS
Richard Hamilton	38	10	22	.455	8	18	.444	2	4	.500	5	6	.833	4	3	7	3	2	0	0	1	27
Ricky Moore	37	6	10	.600	5	9	.556	1	1	1.000	0	1	.000	0	8	8	2	1	0	3	4	13
Kevin Freeman	32	3	6	.500	3	6	.500	0	0		0	0		5	3	8	0	0	3	3	1	6
Jake Voskuhl	28	1	1	1.000	1	1	1.000	0	0		0	0		0	3	3	2	0	2	0	3	2
Khalid El-Amin	22	5	12	.417	5	10	.500	0	2	.000	2	4	.500	3	1	4	4	0	0	6	3	12
Reserves	MP	FG	FGA	FG%	2P	2PA	2P%	3P	3PA	3P%	FT	FTA	FT%	ORB	DRB	TRB	AST	STL	BLK	TOV	PF	PTS
Albert Mouring	17	3	4	.750	3	3	1.000	0	1	.000	0	1	.000	0	3	3	0	0	1	2	1	6
Edmund Saunders	11	1	3	.333	1	3	.333	0	0		2	4	.500	0	3	3	0	0	0	1	3	4
Souleymane Wane	8	2	2	1.000	2	2	1.000	0	0		0	0		0	0	0	0	1	0	0	4	4
Rashamel Jones	6	1	1	1.000	1	1	1.000	0	0		1	2	.500	0	2	2	0	0	0	1	0	3
Antric Klaiber	1	0	0		0	0		0	0		0	0		0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
School Totals	200	32	61	.525	29	53	.547	3	8	.375	10	18	.556	12	26	38	11	4	6	16	20	77

​

Why are you comparing today to 26-27 years ago?

 

[Hungryhusky99]

Feel free to give me their wingspans and make corrections.

You won't be able to.

Bc they aren't available anywhere

 

[Fishy]

It’s a lot of trust to put into a freshman who isn’t a pure PG. I’ve heard the arguments for why this is a fine plan. I trust the staff in terms of both scouting and player development but I remain not entirely convinced. I hope he kills it. They’ve certainly turned combo guards into point guards (TN & SD - but see AM), but they were veterans.

It’s probably a terrible plan given our history of twisted ankles and tweaked knees combined with our general reluctance to trust any freshman with the basketball, but it is the plan. Dan Hurley will really need to commit to actually getting County on the floor so that he’s ready if/when we need him.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

One thing I'm wondering (admitting that I didn't see Stanford play this past season and I didn't know this kid existed until very recently); if we had him i stead of Reibe when we played Michigan would he gave been able to contribute more than Reibe did?

Another question I have is how big were the centers for Villanova's two most recent championship teams (or how much wingspan did they have)? I've been told that somehow those titles are currently very relevant. If that is true, the composition of the roster for each of those teams must also be relevant, unless of course one is willing to pick and choose relevance depending on whether it does or does not support an argument.

 

[Slick]

I'll reluctantly take the 'under' that County is ready as a freshman PG. In the 4-5 games I watched there wasn't a glimmer of the attributes that Silas brings. We just saw multiple games with Silas exiting early in the first half with 2 fouls. I am stunned if they are comfortable going into the season with just the 2 of them. If he is still there, I also don't discount Jacob Ross to bring everything Junior County offers. County may have potential, but as a freshman when you are seeking a national title run....that is a surprising ask.

The film on country doesn’t lie. Excellent ball handler, dynamic passer , and he can create and shoot off the dribble.

 

[Fishy]

I don’t know a hell of a lot about the Belgian kid other than what I saw half-watching late night games on the ACC Network, but he seems like a good program piece.

Can back up both center and power forward, played at a pretty high level in Europe, is used to the style of basketball Dan Hurley wants to play and is smart enough to get through a year at Stanford which would put him in the 99.999999998th percentile of coconuts on this message board.

The machine needs cogs. He seems to be one.

 

[Hurlees4hed]

The film on country doesn’t lie. Excellent ball handler, dynamic passer , and he can create and shoot off the dribble.

At a much lower level of basketball than UConn plays...

 

[Marat]

I'm not sure I can ever get used to Stanford playing in the "Atlantic Coast Conference". That would be like UConn playing in the Pac 12 from before.

 

[Huskyforlife]

I don’t know a hell of a lot about the Belgian kid other than what I saw half-watching late night games on the ACC Network, but he seems like a good program piece.

Can back up both center and power forward, played at a pretty high level in Europe, is used to the style of basketball Dan Hurley wants to play and is smart enough to get through a year at Stanford which would put him in the 99.999999998th percentile of coconuts on this message board.

The machine needs cogs. He seems to be one.

I’d take a kid with my level of intelligence if he hoops good.

 

[superjohn]

Bc they aren't available anywhere

The 4 wingspans I listed- Sanogo's is from the NBA combine measurements 7'2.75. Samson is reported to have a 7'5 wingspan on the UConn website and in CT media. Adam Finkelstein reported Tarris has a 7'5 wingspan. Hines I've only seen his wingspan listed at 7'1.5 from high school and Storrs Central says 7'2.

 

[Fishy]

I’d take a kid with my level of intelligence if he hoops good.

We need to aim higher.

 

[superjohn]

One thing I'm wondering (admitting that I didn't see Stanford play this past season and I didn't know this kid existed until very recently); if we had him i stead of Reibe when we played Michigan would he gave been able to contribute more than Reibe did?

Another question I have is how big were the centers for Villanova's two most recent championship teams (or how much wingspan did they have)? I've been told that somehow those titles are currently very relevant. If that is true, the composition of the roster for each of those teams must also be relevant, unless of course one is willing to pick and choose relevance depending on whether it does or does not support an argument.

Nova's titles will be 9 and 11 years old. It seems more relevant to look at Michigan last year. What the preseason top teams will be rolling out in the frontcourt this upcoming season. If you want to look at past teams it seems like it would make more sense to look at the frontcourts of the UConn back to back.

 

[Fishy]

Can't remember the name of it but Hurley uses an analytics service to evaluate possible portal targets, Schertz is also heavy on analytics. If both are after Giltay I'll trust their judgement

HDI and ShotAnalytics.

 

[Kemba15]

Why are you comparing today to 26-27 years ago?

While the comparison is a bit silly, the broader point stands: in the NIL era, it’s hard to convince proven players to take backup roles. You might land one of these, but rarely more. Even Michigan’s final 4 rotation reflected that—a freshman, an OSU transfer who accepted a smaller role (there’s your one), and role players who never left the program. Ideally, I think we use the remaining money on a guard to replace Solo and a backup 4.

 

[Fishy]

While the comparison is a bit silly, the broader point stands: in the NIL era, it’s hard to convince proven players to take backup roles. You might land one of these, but rarely more. Even Michigan’s final 4 rotation reflected that—a freshman, an OSU transfer who accepted a smaller role (there’s your one), and role players who never left the program. Ideally, I think we use the remaining money on a guard to replace Solo and a backup 4.

What players want and their reality is two different things.

The vast majority of these portal guys are not going to be able to find starting jobs. In fact, it might be harder for them to find starting gigs than ever before - we’re not creating more starting jobs, but now there are a massive number of players competing for them.

In the portal, it’s now a buyers’ market outside of the very top players.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Nova's titles will be 9 and 11 years old. It seems more relevant to look at Michigan last year. What the preseason top teams will be rolling out in the frontcourt this upcoming season. If you want to look at past teams it seems like it would make more sense to look at the frontcourts of the UConn back to back.

So do you agree that Nova's titles are not relevant today?

 

[EBonz30]

Michigan & Florida ripped off UConn’s 23’ & 24’ strategy to have size & length at each position- reason why Purdue’s guards had no shot against us in the title game- our guards were almost twice the size. This is not just a Michigan one year this is where college basketball is going- this has now been going on for about 5 years in where the best teams know they need size & length at each position to cut down nets.