Perhaps the biggest surprise of the night was not that Trevor Mbakwe started in place of Elliott Eliason(we caught rumor of that on Friday and many of us thought starting him heading into the Big Ten was the plan all along), but instead that Eliason didn't play – at all.
After starting every game this season – and every game since Ralph Sampson III went down at the end of February last year, for that matter – Eliason didn't get a single minute on Saturday, leaving those on Twitter to speculate about whether the center was hurt or sick or just what was going on.
In the end, coach Tubby Smith didn't shed much light on exactly what happened, calling Eliason's benching "coach's decision," but his words made it evident that the DNP was disciplinary in nature.
"There's nothing wrong," he said. "We just wanted to make sure he understood some things as well. So that's basically what it's all about."
Smith said that Eliason will "be back, he'll be ready to play," although he wouldn't specify when. The other curious thing, though, was that Smith hesitated to commit to the lineup he threw out on Saturday going forward.
The Gophers got out to a slow start against Lafayette but quickly regrouped. Other than Joe Coleman, no starter finished with more than eight points (Rodney Williams), but the team's depth and balance was spectacular in the victory. But the pause at the start was enough to make Smith ponder whether he would keep that five in tact going forward.
"I didn't like it at first," he said. "I think we looked a little winded and so I wasn't very impressed with it at first. But again it was a change. They were coming off 11 days and the first time Trevor was in the lineup, the first time Elliott hadn't been in the lineup in a long time … We'll continue to evaluate. Like I said tonight, I wasn't impressed with the start of the game, so we'll see."
The other possibility, of course, is that Mbakwe starting was actually a reaction to his plan to bench Eliason for a game. Those are things we'll never know.
