By Aidan Joly
The college basketball season has been over for two weeks and the transfer portal is in full swing.
Plenty of good players remain in the portal as of Tuesday, but many great players have already committed to their new schools, some of whom are set to be major additions for their new teams this season. Let’s get into some of them and how they will impact their new teams.
Tucker DeVries; Old school: Drake | New school: West Virginia
DeVries is the best player in the portal who has committed to far, and he quickly followed his father Darian as he took the head coaching job in Morgantown. A dynamic offensive threat who won the Missouri Valley Conference Player of the Year twice, he averaged 21.6 points, 6.7 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game this past season. He is also a 35.9% three point shooter for his career. He should quickly be the Mountaineers’ best player this year.
Zeke Mayo; Old school: South Dakota State | New school: Kansas
Mayo joins the growing list of Summit League Players of the Year transferring up to the big boys after Max Abmas became the leading scorer at Texas after transferring from Oral Roberts and Baylor Scheierman starring at Creighton after winning the award, also at South Dakota State. Mayo averaged 18.8 points and 5.7 rebounds per game this year at SDSU, while shooting 38.3% from three for his career. He scored 19 points on 11 shots against Iowa State in the NCAA tournament, a hint of how he can do against Big 12 competition.
Jeremy Roach; Old school: Duke | New school: Baylor
The last link to the Mike Krzyzewski era at Duke, Roach is a smart and experienced guard who has 108 starts to his name in his time with the Blue Devils. He was third team All-ACC this year after averaging 14.0 points and 3.3 assists per game this season. It’s a one-year rental, and Roach will replace RayJ Dennis at the point guard position in Waco.
AJ Storr; Old school: Wisconsin | New school: Kansas
Another great add for Bill Self and the Jayhawks, who picked up a second of the top five or six players in the portal. He was a huge part of the offense at Wisconsin this past season, averaging 16.8 points per game, but only did shoot 43.4% from the field. With better playmakers around him this season, the 6-foot-6 wingman should be able to improve his efficiency.
Mark Mitchell; Old school: Duke | New school: Missouri
Mitchell is a former five-star prospect who still has NBA-level upside. He started 67 games in two seasons at Duke, playing both forward positions, but mostly played the power forward position in 2023-24. In that role, he averaged 11.6 points and 6.0 rebounds per game while shooting 54% from the field. Missouri is in a deep rebuild after going 0-18 in SEC play in 2023-24, but Mitchell could become a star for them. He has two seasons of eligibility remaining.
Tramon Mark; Old school: Arkansas | New school: Texas
Mark spent three seasons at Houston before going to Fayetteville for one season, where he averaged 16.2 points per game on 48.2% from the field. He has never been that efficient of a shooter, a career 42.4% from the field (improving on the career mark in 2023-24) and just 32% from three. However, Texas is losing all of its top four scorers, so Mark will have to be a real scoring option this season.
Oumar Ballo; Old school: Arizona | New school: Indiana
Ballo doesn’t have a ton of versatility to his game as a seven-foot center, but averaged 12.9 points and 10.1 rebounds per game at Arizona this past season. Despite that, he is a difficult player to defend due to his size and does play well on the defensive end of the floor. He has been productive at an elite program, and will help Indiana replace Kel’el Ware, who is heading to the NBA.
Robbie Avila; Old school: Indiana State | New school: Saint Louis
Avila, who became a college hoops folk hero this season, is also a good player. The 6-foot-10 center averaged 17.4 points per game at Indiana State on 53.6% shooting and also grabbed 6.6 rebounds per contest. He also shot 39.4% from three and plays a very good inside-out game. That makes him a different type of player. He is following coach Josh Schertz, who also went from Indiana State to Saint Louis in the coaching carousel.
Tony Perkins; Old school: Iowa | New school: Missouri
Another solid get for Dennis Gates as Missouri continues its rebuild. Perkins started all of Iowa’s 34 games this season and averaged 14.0 points, 4.6 assists and 1.6 steals per game. He is also a great defender, as can be seen in his steal numbers. Perkins is a physical guard who should have a big role on this year’s team, while creating a nice duo with the aforementioned Mitchell.
Darlinstone Dubar; Old school: Hofstra | New school: Tennessee
The second year in a row that Hofstra has had a star guard come to the SEC, Dubar follows former Alabama guard Aaron Estrada. Dubar, a 6-foot-6 wing, averaged 17.8 points and 6.8 rebounds for the Pride this season. Dubar started his career at Iowa State in 2020-21 and got a starting nod in seven games. With a good shot and good size, he will try to help replace All-American Dalton Knecht in Knoxville.
Zvonimir Ivisic; Old school: Kentucky | New school: Arkansas
Ivisic showed some amazing flashes of potential at Kentucky this season. In his debut in January against Georgia, the 7-foot-2 Croatian scored 13 points on 5-7 shooting in 18 minutes, and then scored 18 points on 7-11 in 20 minutes against Alabama later in the season. A rare combination of size, skill and shooting ability, a full off-season to develop and condition could very well make him an elite player as he joins John Calipari at Arkansas.
Meechie Johnson; Old school: South Carolina | New school: Ohio State
Johnson was the leading scorer for South Carolina last season, averaging 14.1 points per game, but was somewhat inefficient shooting the ball, at just 39.9%. He returns to Columbus with this move, where he played 43 games between 2020 and 2022, starting five of them. He will have one season of eligibility under new coach Jake Diebler.
Kobe Johnson; Old school: USC | New school: UCLA
Johnson is more of a defensive presence than anything else. He’s elite at that, and it showed up in collecting 2.2 steals per game for the Trojans this past season. He also averaged 10.9 points per game, albeit on a team that struggled a lot of the way. He will be a plug-and-play veteran player as he heads to the other side of town to play for Mick Cronin.
Malik Mack; Old school: Harvard | New school: Georgetown
A great pickup for Georgetown and Ed Cooley as he continues the rebuild of the program. Mack averaged 17.2 points and 4.8 assists per game as a freshman at Harvard on the way to the Ivy League Rookie of the Year award. He had 18 points and six assists in a game against Boston College and had 27 against Indiana, a great indicator of what kind of player he can be against high-major competition.
Milos Uzan; Old school: Oklahoma | New school: Houston
Uzan, a 6-foot-4 guard, started 56 games in two seasons in Norman. He is very smart with the basketball, averaging 4.7 assists per game to just 2.1 turnovers per game. Scoring the basketball he is solid, averaging 9.0 points per game on 39.2% from the field, which was a large falloff from 47% from the field as a freshman. In any event, Uzan will be tasked with being part of the replacement of star point guard Jamal Shead. He won’t, and shouldn’t, handle that task alone.
Aljiah Martin; Old school: Florida Atlantic | New school: Florida
It’s easy to be a fan of what Todd Golden has done at Florida the past few years, and it seems like Martin can be a player who fits into that system smoothly. Martin earned all-conference honors three times at FAU to the tune of a career 11.9 points per game and shooting 36.9% from three. He is also a good player at the defensive end of the floor. Martin is a proven player who has been a key contributor on winning teams. He should be able to do the same as he moves up to the SEC.
Dug McDaniel; Old school: Michigan | New school: Kansas State
Even though Michigan was bad this season, McDaniel averaged 16.3 points and 4.7 assists per game while shooting 36.8% from three. McDaniel, who is just 5-foot-11, also is a pretty good defensive player who was probably the Wolverines’ best defensive player this past season. He will immediately be thrown into a Kansas State team that needs to improve its guard play. He should be able to be a key cog there.
Tyrese Hunter; Old school: Texas | New school: Memphis
A former Big 12 Rookie of the Year at Iowa State in 2021-22, Hunter spent two seasons at Texas and started 71 games, averaging 10.7 points per game in those two seasons. After he was a star freshman at Iowa State it seemed like he would be a star, but it has not worked out that way. A slight step down might allow him to be one of the top players on a good team, provided Memphis can figure it out this season.
Skyy Clark; Old school: Louisville | New school: UCLA
This is a strange fit on the surface. Clark and Mick Cronin seem to not go together at all, but they’ll give it a shot. A former top-40 prospect who spent one season at Illinois, which was really only 13 games, he led a bad Louisville team with 13.2 points per game. Anyone who has followed him the past few years knows that he has a wildly erratic career so far. He’ll look to turn it around at UCLA.
Myles Rice; Old school: Washington State | New school: Indiana
Rice was a big part of the Washington State team that got the program to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2008, averaging 14.8 points, 3.8 assists and 1.6 steals per game in his first season of college basketball. He will need to improve on his three-point shooting after he shot just 27.5%, very low for a 6-foot-2 guard. However, there is a lot to like if he develops right with three seasons of eligibility left. He should also be a big part of upgrading Indiana’s guard play.
AJ Hoops 