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Let’s take a moment to reminisce about Colorado’s two seniors
We’re reaching the conclusion of the 2023-24 regular season, which means it’s time to get sentimental. The Colorado Buffaloes will celebrate senior night on Sunday night during their final home game of the season. Two seniors will be honored before CU faces off against the Stanford Cardinal; Tristan da Silva and Luke O’Brien.
Da Silva arrived in Boulder in 2020, moving halfway across the globe to play basketball for the Buffaloes. After playing high school ball in Germany, the forward made the decision to come play college hoops in the Pac-12, just like his brother Oscar did with Stanford.
As a freshman, da Silva played in 24 games during Colorado’s eventual run to the second round of the NCAA Tournament, learning from the likes of McKinley Wright, Evan Battey and D’Shawn Schwartz. As Colorado’s stars left to play in the pros one-by-one, Tristan’s role gradually increased. In seemingly no time at all, he’d become one of the nation’s top wings.
During his time in Boulder, da Silva netted a total of 1305 points and made 478 field goals, good for tenth all-time in program history. Tristan was also one of the Buffaloes’ strongest defensive presences, racking up 98 steals and 48 blocks in black and gold. Da Silva’s growth on the court has been an absolute joy to watch, but his blossoming into a leader has been special.
Before the 2022-23 season, da Silva was handed the reins to a young and inexperienced Buffaloes team after the departure of Evan Battey. Da Silva, known as one of the team’s quieter guys at the time, was thrusted into the daunting role of being the team’s go-to guy on and off the court for Colorado.
Safe to say, he’s done a fantastic job leading the Buffaloes. Tad often praises da Silva as his team’s golden standard for the youngsters like Cody Williams, RJ Smith and Assane Diop, proving just how highly Colorado’s staff thinks of their star forward.
Da Silva has undeniably left his print on Colorado Buffaloes basketball and will be greatly missed next season. Bigger and better things are on the horizon for da Silva, as he’s projected to be a first round pick in this year’s NBA Draft.
CU Basketball’s media team prepared this emotional video, honoring da Silva’s time as a Buffalo before his final home game on Sunday:
Much like da Silva, Luke O’Brien came to Boulder as part of the 2020-21 recruiting class. A local kid out of Columbine High School in Littleton, O’Brien came to perfectly embody Colorado basketball.
Since his emergence off the bench in 2022, O’Brien proved himself to be one of Colorado’s most fundamentally sound players and a phenomenal sixth-man. O’Brien has always been a reliable scorer, making 43.8% of his FG attempts as a Buffalo. He played each minute at 100% effort and was an absolute workhorse off of some relatively shallow CU benches, but he’ll be remembered most for doing the small things right.
He’s always been on top of setting his screens, he’s a smart and willing passer and had an absolute craving for coming down with boards. O’Brien has totaled 380 career rebounds as a Buff, 116 of them coming off the offensive board. Luke finished twelfth in the Pac-12 in rebounds in 2022-23, despite averaging only 22.7 minutes per game.
O’Brien has been one of Colorado’s most underrated players in his time in Boulder, being a foundational piece that helped uphold the Buffaloes’ reputation as a defense-first powerhouse. Luke truly became Tad Boyle’s idea of Colorado Buffalo to a T, making his departure from Boulder an emotional one.
Both on and off the floor, da Silva and O’Brien have put in an immeasurable amount of work to help our Buffaloes win. Fans who want to cheer on Colorado’s two seniors at the CU Event Center one final time should get to Sunday’s game extra early, as the ceremony starts 20 minutes before tipoff.
by RylandScholes
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