Pros and Cons of adding Korie Lucious to the Marquette basketball team

A variety of sources (twitter, USA Today, Detroit Free Press) in the last week have indicated that former Michigan State Spartan and Milwaukee native, Korie Lucious, will transfer to another school after his dismissal by Tom Izzo. The two leading candidates appear to be Iowa State University and Marquette. Lucious visited Iowa State recently and reported to have a good time....of course has anyone ever read a post by a recruit anywhere where they said they had a terrible time? Lucious has several "best friends" on the Iowa State team, including former Spartan Chris Allen and Milwaukee native Diante Garrett.

He is expected to visit Marquette soon, though he's certainly been around the Marquette campus many times throughout the years, including Summer pickup games with members of the UW-M and Marquette teams. He knows the campus and Buzz Williams.

That leads us to the pressing question....is it a good idea for Marquette and Buzz Williams to take on Korie Lucious?

Let's take a look at the Pros and Cons of such a transfer.


CONS

• Lucious was recently kicked off the Michigan State program by Tom Izzo, one of the legendary coaches in the NCAA who has been known to have a fairly liberal leash. If you're kicked off by Izzo, you've done something seriously wrong. Why was he kicked off other than the standard "Conduct Detrimental To The Team"? Rumors aplenty on the actual reason, if you search the internet they are there to be found. One would imagine if either of the two most consistent rumors were true, there would be no chance of him coming to MU...one would imagine. Of course, who knows if either of those rumors are true or perhaps our staff believes Mr. Lucious deserves yet another chance.

• Lucious was suspended for the season opener this year back in November after a conviction on reckless driving, a charge that originally was driving while intoxicated but was reduced.

• Lucious is not foreign to transfers....he originally played at Rufus King for two years before a controversial transfer to Pius XI to play for Joel Claassen. Of course, he only has one year of college eligibility left so this will be his last rodeo in the NCAA.

• Tying up 2 years of a scholarship for one year of actual playing time? Does that make sense for a kid that doesn't exactly have the greatest Career College Stats? 6.5 points per game is a career high, he doesn't shoot well and his assist total rather pedestrian when you account for the highly touted recruits on the MSU roster the last few years. His Assist to Turnover ratio is poor

• He has never lived up to the hype coming out of high school. He was rated as highly as 28th in one service and top 100 overall in the RSCI at 87. Is this because the talent level at MSU didn't allow him to blossom by being the main guy?
  

• By taking Lucious, does this push MU out of the running for some other top guards for the 2012-13 year?

• From an image perspective, does MU need to add a kid that has had these most recent issues to it's squad?

PROS

• Has NCAA tournament experience, including playing in the NCAA Championship game and two Final Fours.

• Plays the point guard position where MU seems to have no true super star at that position....then again, Lucious isn't a super star either, but the depth would be nice.

• Since Lucious was suspended and ultimately kicked off, Michigan State is in an epic free fall. That being said, I would argue they were fairly middle of the road even with Lucious, but they certainly have gone down several additional notches since his ouster.

• One would assume after multiple chances, multiple suspensions and a dismissal, he would finally be willing to listen and play his final year of hoops the right way. The year off could be a blessing and a shot of maturity for the young man.
  

An interesting decision ahead for both the young man and a young coach at Marquette.