Red Raider Season Review: Lamar Washington

Mar 16, 2023 - 3:59 PM

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Welcome back to my Red Raider season reviews. Next up: True Freshman Lamar Washington.

Lamar had a lot of high points and low points this season, that is just what's expected of a true freshman. There was a lot of expectation put on him and he delivered in a lot of key moments, including big games like Kansas State was key in the comeback against Iowa State. Lets break down what went good and what went bad for Lamar Washington this year in Lubbock.

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The Good:

• Lamar was an extremely good young asset to have, especially on the defensive side of the ball. He’s athletic, good with his hands and made life difficult for a lot of ball-handlers in the Big 12. This was noticeable in a lot of games this season. He had 5 steals at home against Kansas State, and multiple 2+ steal games in the non-conference portion of the season.
• Later in the year, Lamar started to hit some 3 point shots, which wasn’t really expected much when he came in. He hit 2 against K-State, 2 against Oklahoma State, and 1 against Baylor. It doesn’t seem like much, but he slowly started to become more confident in taking that shot as the season progressed.
• Washington was really a great distributor at times this season for Texas Tech. He had 5 assists against Oklahoma State and Baylor, 3 against Texas, and had multiple other 2+ assist games.

Lamar definitely had his good points this season, but there is also a lot of areas for improvement for the freshman, which is expected. Here are some negatives I noticed from Washington.

The Bad:

• Turnovers. Lamar just had a couple rough games where he turned it over quite a bit. He had 5 against Texas, 6 @ Oklahoma State, 5 vs Louisville, and multiple others with 3+ TOs. This is a fixable problem that is expected from a freshman guard, but still something to be worked on none the less.
• Being a consistent offensive threat. When Lamar attacked, he was really damn good. He could get to the rim, draw fouls and create his own shot. So why is this a negative? I felt he wasn’t aggressive enough at times. I felt there were a lot of times there was a path to the rim and Lamar would just be passive, I expect him to be much more aggressive next season at trying to score the rock.
• Consistency. It’s expected from all freshmen that there will be struggles with consistency. It just comes with the jump from high school ball to college ball. Lamar had these same struggles, but also showed a lot of good skills. He has areas for improvement and a lot to build off of, this will be an important offseason for him.

The Final Verdict:

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Lamar Washington showed a ton of promise in a lot of games this season. Like all young guards, he has a lot to learn. Learning from an experienced guard like De’vion Harmon is going to be so beneficial for him. He’s going to consistently look better as his career continues, I just hope that he’s in a Texas Tech uniform while it happens.

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