March and the early part of April marked a very bleak time for the Nebraska basketball team under Tim Miles. After finishing the season with loss after loss and the announcement that Miles was coming back, several players announced they were leaving the program. It appeared as though the school was moving backwards when it comes to where it was headed.

Over the last week, the Huskers’ basketball team has finally taken a turn that should inspire hope in fans of the school. First there was the commitment of four-star guard Thomas Allen. Allen had been a commit to North Carolina State but the Cornhuskers benefitted from their team’s firing of its head coach.

On Sunday, Miles got more good news, as Winthrop graduate transfer Duby Okeke announced he was headed to Nebraska.

The Nebraska basketball team finds a diamond in the rough

While the loss of Ed Morrow is one that isn’t going to be easy to overcome, Nebraska did manage to get itself a big man who can be an issue for opponents in the middle. Okeke announced his plans to transfer to the Huskers’ Basketball Team on Instagram, was in Lincoln over the weekend. While this is not a big time scorer, averaging just 3.2 points per game, he is someone who has a habit of blocking shots.

Winthrop, unlike Nebraska managed to make the NCAA Tournament and Okeke played a part in that while also hauling down 3.9 rebounds per game.

More importantly for his new basketball team, the former Winthrop player holds his former school’s record for blocks in a career.

Positivity for Nebraska still fragile

With the commitments of Allen and Okeke, there are still two scholarships that are available for the 2017 class. The real question is whether Tim Miles has indeed stopped the backwards trend of the basketball program.

Nebraska might be reloading as Miles has done the last few years. Can we expect even more graduate transfers or simply transfers from other power five schools? It’s not known yet.

The Huskers are now a bigger question mark than they were a few weeks ago. The program is not going back to the days when Barry Collier and Doc Sadler were at the helm, undertalented players beating up on weak opponents.

It appears the talent level is still better than those days. The problem is that the Big Ten has plenty of talent. The Cornhuskers are still going to find the going rough, unless the current version of Miles’ squad has entirely bought in. It’s possible the players that left town, were the last vestiges of a group that had banded against their head coach. Only time will tell if the bleeding has truly been stopped for Nebraska.