Coach Ford isn't giving any details as to whether this pertains to the allegations over the summer, new allegations, or something we don't even know about yet. But whatever the reason, it looks like the Cowboys could be without the power forward who last season brought much needed size and strength inside while averaging 8.2 ppg, and 6.6 rebs.
Pilgrim was not announced with the team at the Homecoming and Hoops event on Friday, and was seen sitting in the stands in street clothes. When asked for comment Coach Ford said:
Since I'm not very good at analyzing legal issues, or team inner-working issues that I know nothing about (I could continue this list of things I'm not very good at if you want) , I guess I can only comment on how Pilgrim's absence will affect the Cowboys rotation.
We have to assume that Coach Ford was planning on going with the (often experimented with last season) starting lineup of Pilgrim and Moses at the four and five to add muscle to the inside. Now does that spot go to the true freshman Michael Cobbins? Cobbins is the dude that we are all excited to see make an impact, but is he D1 ready? Could that starting position go to the more experienced and bigger Darrell Williams? Williams is a juco transfer who was looked at as a top 15 juco recruit, and Coach Ford was so excited about bringing him in he forgot to count the number of scholarships he had available to offer.
And since I forgot to cover Williams in my "meet the new guys" post last week (thanks for reminding me "e-mailing readers")... this is what Travis (first name basis) had to say about him after signing him:
"Darrell brings us some great experience," Ford said. "He's one of the top-five junior college big men in the country. You can pretty much write down a double-double every night for him. He has extreme versatility. He can really handle the ball and step out. He's very athletic and understands the game."
It will be a wait and see deal obviously, but Coach Ford's choice of words makes me think we won't be seeing Matt for awhile, if at all this season.... so we will keep an eye on the development of Cobbins, Williams, or anyone else that steps up, to try and best guess how the void left in the middle will be filled.