Senior forward Edis Dervisevic has been suspended indefinitely from the Long Beach State men’s basketball team for failure to meet academic expectations.
The announcement was made on Monday–the same day that the ‘Niners opened Big West Conference play with a 74-60 win over UC Irvine.
Dervisevic is academically eligible to participate, but LBSU head coach Dan Monson made the decision to hold him off the squad until he can get his academics back on track.
“Edis has been suspended indefinitely for a lack of academic commitment,” Monson said in a statement on Monday. “He has put himself in jeopardy of not reaching his ultimate goal, a goal which every senior has realized in our five years here, obtaining his college degree. We are going to give him the necessary time to get both his books and priorities in order, and he will not represent us on the court until both are accomplished. In the meantime, this team will band together, as it has with past suspensions or injuries, and continue to represent Long Beach State to the best of their ability.”
Prior to being suspended, Dervisevic was averaging 3.4 points and 2.8 rebounds in 15.7 minutes per game this season. What LBSU will miss, though, is the toughness, energy and experience off of the bench that he provided.
The loss of Dervisevic will open up more playing time for freshman Nick Shepherd at the backup forward position. Shepherd matched his season–high in minutes played with nine on Monday against UCI.
When asked about how the extra minutes will be allocated after Monday’s win over the ‘Eaters, coach Monson said that he’s still making that determination.
“[Figuring out playing time] is going to be a process.” He said, “He [Shepherd] got nine minutes and Edis was averaging 15, and he [Shepherd] won’t get all 15 of those.”
Monson also said he liked the way his four–guard set looked on the floor against the Anteaters.
“I thought the four guards at one time looked okay.” He said, “In this league there’s not a lot of big guys, so we were probably gonna have to do that anyway.”
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