After nearly two years off, the wait is finally over for Walker

The last time Derrick Walker was on the floor in a college basketball game, he helped Tennessee knock off Iowa in the second round of the 2019 NCAA Tournament.

That was 653 days ago.

Since then, the 6-foot-8, 232-pound native of Kansas City, Mo., transferred to Nebraska in May of 2019 and sat out last season.

When it looked like he was finally ready to make his Husker debut this year, the NCAA abruptly suspended Walker for the first 11 games due to a violation of team and NCAA rules he committed back at Tennessee.

To top it off, Walker officially joined the active roster this week and was set to play his first game at NU tonight at Purdue. That game was postponed Monday evening due to COVID-19 precautions, extending his wait a few days longer.

Assuming the Huskers tip-off at home against Indiana on Sunday night, Walker’s long and tedious path from Knoxville, Tenn., to Lincoln, Neb., will finally take the next step. It will be a day Walker, at times, thought might never come.

“I don’t even know where to start,” Walker said when asked about his prolonged absence from game action. “It’s been a while.”

Now 24 years old with 64 games of experience at Tennessee under his belt, Walker will provide a dose of on-court veteran leadership that Nebraska desperately needs amid a four-game losing streak.

He only averaged 0.8 points and 1.1 rebounds in just over five minutes per game as a sophomore at UT. But when Walker did get the ball, he was extremely efficient.

He shot 53 percent from the field as a sophomore and nearly 60 percent as a freshman, including hitting 68 percent in SEC play.

Head coach Fred Hoiberg said Walker would give NU an effective finisher at the rim and a big man who could elevate the pick-and-roll game as a capable scoring option as the screener.

Even more, Hoiberg thinks Walker gained some unique perspective watching the Huskers’ rocky start to the season from the sidelines.

“Derrick’s a very popular player on this team,” Hoiberg said. “He’s done a phenomenal job in the year and a half that he’s been here as a sit-out of continuing to lead through that. Being on the sideline, sometimes you see it a little bit more clearly what’s going on out there on the floor and how you can come in and help fix it and correct it…

“He’s obviously a guy that we are all very excited to have back on the floor, from the coaches all the way down to the players to the support staff because he does things the right way. When you get a guy like that who works as hard as he does, he’s an easy guy to root for.”

Both Hoiberg and Walker made it clear that the redshirt junior still had plenty of catching up to do with his physical conditioning.

While he’s ramped up his workload in practices the past few weeks preparing for his return, Walker knows there is a significant difference between practice shape and game shape.

But Walker’s role in Nebraska’s rotation will almost certainly increase in every game he plays. All he cares about right now is finally getting the chance to help his team win when it mattered the most.

“I have experience, so when I say something, these guys will be able to actually trust and believe in me,” Walker said. “I’m going to play hard. These guys know that I’m going to play hard, and I’m going to make the right read.

“They know that I want to get them to the ball, that I want them to score, and I want us as a team to win.”