Nikolaos Chitikoudis comes to Cintas by way of Robert Morris. He is a 6’9″, 215lb forward with one more year of eligibility. In the Horizon League last year, he averaged 11.3 points, 7.7 rebounds, and 1.8 assists per game. Nikolaos started 27/32 games he played in this year for the Colonials. He spent his first two years of college at North Carolina A&T, where he was a consistent starter.
What to Expect on the Court:
As mentioned, Nikolas averaged 11/8/2 this year for RMU, who was a surprise in the Horizon League this year. Anytime we have a lower major guy making the jump, I like to pull stat lines from high majors and look at those. RMU played Iowa to open the season and Nikolas put up 14/8/1 before fouling out. He did this on 7-11 from the field and 0-2 from the FT line. Their second game of the year was Drake, and Nikolas was able to put up 18/10 on the night and fouled 2 times. Chitikoudis took just 2 three point attempts on the year, missing both. He did, however, shoot 54.7% from inside the arc on 296 attempts. He got to the free throw line 98 times, making just 39% of attempts. He is brought into this year’s Xavier squad with a clear intention: Grab offensive rebounds and get easy putbacks in limited action. I do expect him to be the 4th big in the rotation (behind Jovan, Nwoko, and Aligbe). On defense, he is a great rebounder, and he is a threat to block a shot or two.
Player Comparison:
This is difficult to give a comparison that will be well known, and I’m not sure how well this will hit, but Josh Oduro from George Mason (2024) is a comparison I’ll run with. While he lacks Oduro’s volume scoring, Chitikoudis operates with a similar presence. He is a high-IQ facilitator from the post who keeps the gears of Richard Pitino’s offense turning. Think of him as the defensive-minded version of Oduro someone who wins with positioning, rebounding and passing rather just isolation buckets.
This is a great depth piece, and one that I expect to see bring the front court to complete status. If X were to add another piece, it’ll be a guard or wing, and likely a shooter.
