Former 'Cane Austin Swartz Excelling at Creighton

[Trinton Breeze]

Sometimes a fresh start is all it takes.

After departing Miami following the 2024–25 season, former four-star guard Austin Swartz has quietly put together a strong sophomore campaign at Creighton.

The year didn’t start with fireworks. Swartz opened the season slowly, easing into minutes and points, but things flipped around by mid-December. Once he found his rhythm, the buckets started coming. The breakout moment came against Xavier, where Swartz caught fire, and he hasn’t really cooled...

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[Trav]

He's one of the few I wanted us to keep. Speaking of which, Ogochukwu is having a better season than Bethea (who might just be a bust) and Djobet is lighting it up for Omaha (Summit League).

 

[Canedude08]

A bit of a cheap shot article, but it is what it is. Swartz was a decently rated recruit that was stuck on a bad team and needed development, same with Divine, a player that was forced to eat huge minutes, despite not being ready for it. Is that a lack of development that true freshmen were able to show signs of life as sophomores? Probably not because had Miami been a deeper program, Swartz and Divine would have been redshirts, or bit players.

By the way, Norchad Omier was part of a Final Four team and an All-ACC level talent while at Miami, let's stop pretending that he wasn't developed and utilized well here. He left Miami because the NIL budget wouldn't allow for L to meet his price and put a team worth a crap around him, period. Even with Omier walking, the budget was trash and we saw the end result of us cheaping out on talent.

Wooga needed a change of scenery, he mentally tanked it his last year in Miami, and I think L was over it. Wooga changed once money got involved and it was ugly. That said, he was always a talent, and was highly productive at Miami, especially when he was healthy and motivated.

Joseph was a guy that wanted to play starter's minutes(Which was understandable), but you couldn't have Pack and Joseph on the floor at the same time, so he had to seek greener pastures. He was a high end 6th man and a major contributor on the Final Four team. Had Pack not decided to run it back, there's a good chance Bensley would have decided to stick around, and become the starting PG. This "They left Miami and blossomed, must be something that L didn't do" narrative is factually untrue. In a transfer portal world, teams will lose major contributors, and they will go somewhere and remain contributors, especially if they get an uptick in minutes.

 

[Trav]

I think it does prove the team was worse than the sum of its parts last year. They never would have been great but there was enough talent to be a middling ACC team. Coach L knew it was time to hang it up and did at the right time.

 

[JZCane0825]

Yea the ‘excelling after leaving Miami’ declaration is a bit hot-takey @Trinton Breeze, especially since we’re now factoring multiple staffs. I know you’re young but may want to think about rephrasing before you post.

 

[JZCane0825]

A bit of a cheap shot article, but it is what it is. Swartz was a decently rated recruit that was stuck on a bad team and needed development, same with Divine, a player that was forced to eat huge minutes, despite not being ready for it. Is that a lack of development that true freshmen were able to show signs of life as sophomores? Probably not because had Miami been a deeper program, Swartz and Divine would have been redshirts, or bit players.

By the way, Norchad Omier was part of a Final Four team and an All-ACC level talent while at Miami, let's stop pretending that he wasn't developed and utilized well here. He left Miami because the NIL budget wouldn't allow for L to meet his price and put a team worth a crap around him, period. Even with Omier walking, the budget was trash and we saw the end result of us cheaping out on talent.

Wooga needed a change of scenery, he mentally tanked it his last year in Miami, and I think L was over it. Wooga changed once money got involved and it was ugly. That said, he was always a talent, and was highly productive at Miami, especially when he was healthy and motivated.

Joseph was a guy that wanted to play starter's minutes(Which was understandable), but you couldn't have Pack and Joseph on the floor at the same time, so he had to seek greener pastures. He was a high end 6th man and a major contributor on the Final Four team. Had Pack not decided to run it back, there's a good chance Bensley would have decided to stick around, and become the starting PG. This "They left Miami and blossomed, must be something that L didn't do" narrative is factually untrue. In a transfer portal world, teams will lose major contributors, and they will go somewhere and remain contributors, especially if they get an uptick in minutes.

Omier’s scoring dropped slightly at Baylor. Wooga was nominally better at Nova, albeit on higher usage. Bensley has been pretty meh as a starter at Providence.

The younger guys were always going to be flight risks with an entirely new staff, and let’s stop pretending that Swartz was going to be anything more than a solid rotational player on this roster.

Just really lazy journalism.

 

[Canedude08]

I think it does prove the team was worse than the sum of its parts last year. They never would have been great but there was enough talent to be a middling ACC team. Coach L knew it was time to hang it up and did at the right time.

There was a lack of legit depth and there was also a toxic atmosphere around the team, due to the parts not fitting correctly. L realized that 1) It was difficult to compete when your budget is trash(It's not an accident that Lucas got a budget that L would have killed for) and 2) L didn't want to go through another rebuild at his age. He walked away once it became evident that he was a victim of his own success, and it was time to go.