Poellnitz commits to UT for 2009-10
6/25/2008
Toledoan Chris Poellnitz averaged 15.6 points last year as a freshman at Iowa Western CC.
Chris Poellnitz's nomadic basketball journey will soon come full circle.
Poellnitz, who attended several area high schools, has verbally committed to play at the University of Toledo for the 2009-10 season.
Poellnitz is currently in between his freshman and sophomore seasons at Iowa Western Community College where he averaged 15.6 points per game last year. He will have two seasons of eligibility with the Rockets.
"It just looked like a good situation for me," Poellnitz said. "I met with coach [Gene] Cross and his staff and they seem real genuine. They have a nice outlook of where they want to go with the program."
Poellnitz is much traveled. He spent his freshman year on Scott's varsity squad before transferring to St. John's where he didn't play.
Poellnitz was at Maumee for the first half of his sophomore season before being ruled ineligible. He surfaced at Libbey for the 2004-05 season where he averaged 12.5 points as a junior. From there, Poellnitz attended Patterson School in North Carolina for two years.
Poellnitz signed with Appalachian State while at Patterson but did not qualify academically. That scholarship offer remained from the Mountaineers, but Poellnitz elected to return home instead.
"I know that it hasn't been a great past in Toledo basketball, but when I sat down with coach Cross he was very specific about the direction he wanted to go with the program," Poellnitz said.
"It sounded like something I wanted to be a part of."
At 6-foot-3, Poellnitz considers himself a "scoring point guard." He shot 54 percent from the field last year, including 39 percent on 3-pointers.
Poellnitz was the second-leading scorer on a team that finished 28-5 and placed six sophomores at NCAA Division I programs.
"I had to start from the bottom and work my way up," Poellnitz said. "I had a lot of good people that really made me better."
Contact Ryan Autullo at:
rautullo@theblade.com.