Florida State basketball: 3 starting lineup options for 2020-2021 season

Scottie Barnes leads the way

One thing we can already plug into place for Leonard Hamilton and the Florida State men’s basketball team next season is that a large part of everything on the court will revolve around five-star recruit Scottie Barnes.

Barnes, a wing out of Montverde who will be 19 for all of his freshman season, is a prototypical Hamilton recruit. A long 6-foot-8 play-maker, Barnes’ talent will demand opportunities to initiate the Seminoles’ offense. He will take Vassell’s place in the starting lineup.

That leaves senior M.J. Walker to capably man the other wing spot after starting 24 games as a junior this year.

Unfortunately, the Seminoles also will lose graduating senior Trent Forrest. The likely substitute is RayQuan Evans, a career bench player who played well as Forrest’s backup in the past. That’s assuming Hamilton searches for a fairly traditional point guard to take Forrest’s spot in the lineup.

Alongside Barnes, Walker and Evans, the Seminoles will bring back Raiquan Gray and Malik Osborne in the frontcourt. Hamilton is perfectly comfortable starting small, and this starting lineup brings enough length on the wing to make up for not having a traditional rim protector.

Best-case scenario: Evans, Walker, Barnes, Osborne, Gray