Texas Basketball: 4 players that will breakout in 2020-21 season

4) Who could breakout for Texas basketball: Gerald Liddell

There are a few recurring names on this Texas team that constantly appear among those who the fans are truly waiting to breakout at some point in the near future. One of those that pretty consistently comes to mind is the former highly touted four-star recruit and Steele High School product Gerald Liddell.

This 6-foot-8 and 200 pound lengthy junior small forward ranked as a top 50 high school prospect in the nation for the 2018 recruiting cycle, but he just hasn’t lived up to the hype as of yet. Liddell just needs one big season so that he can prove that he deserves to get a starting role on Smart’s squad at the three or four.

During the 2019-20 season, Liddell played in 15 games for Smart and the Longhorns (10 of which he started in). He averaged 4.4 points per game, 3.3 rebounds, 1.0 assists, 0.5 steals, and 0.7 blocks. Liddell shot 40.3 percent from the field, 33.3 percent from beyond the arc, and 48.0 percent from the free-throw line.

There are aspects of Liddell’s game that he clearly needs to get better in. Namely, he needs to stay healthy throughout the entirety of a season, which is something he wasn’t able to in his first two years on the Forty Acres. The good news for Liddell and the Longhorns is that he was cleared for preseason training camp this fall after recovering from a back injury.