Ole Miss center Karlis Silins injures left knee and is out indefinitely

Ole Miss is apparently short one, um, big man on the depth chart (sorry) as of Wednesday afternoon, after it was reported that redshirt freshman Karlis Silins re-injured his left knee and now requires surgery. Woof.

Silins tore the ACL in the self-same knee last year. According to Antonio Morales, he’s out indefinitely.

It’s unclear how this affects the Basketsharks’ rotation, which was by necessity already going to run with guard-heavy sets. According to Kory Keys, the Rebs could throw out as many as four “guards” on the floor at the same time, with one big in the middle. They’re deep and athletic out on the perimeter, with Terence Davis and Breein Tyree holding the ability to score at the rim. The whole platoon is fast, and it’d honestly be fun as hell to watch them skate all over the floor and score 80 points per game.

The starting five for the season opener was already probably going to be Tyree, Davis, Deandre Burnett, Markel Crawford, and Dominik Olejniczak, who’s listed on Ole Miss’ roster at 7’0. Maybe Justas Furmanavicius would go at the four, with Crawford and Marcanvis Hymon coming of the bench, but Crawford seems like the better option.

In any case, this is an unfortunate turn of events for Silins and the team generally, which is already thin on big men. After Crawford, the next tallest guys available are Furmanavicius (6’7) and someone named Bruce Stevens (6’8). Fans should probably expect a lot of small ball this year.