NCAA Basketball: Top 25 offseason team winners from 2023 transfer portal
1. St. John’s Red Storm
Incoming transfers: Daniss Jenkins, Cruz Davis, Sean Conway, Nahiem Alleyne, Jordan Dingle, RJ Luis, Chris Ledlum, Glenn Taylor Jr., Zuby Ejiofor, Sadiku Ibine Ayo
When head coach Rick Pitino took over the St. John’s program, he essentially cleaned house, with big man Joel Soriano the lone rotation player to come back. He started out slow when it came to additions, bringing bench players Davis and Ibine Ayo with him from Iona. Allenye was the early big name, coming over after winning a national title at UConn.
But then came the big names. Jenkins is another former Iona player that joined but he was a big part of the team that just went to the NCAA Tournament, averaging 15.6 ppg and 4.9 apg as the starting point guard. And Taylor was a starter at Oregon State last season, producing 11.6 ppg. Conway, a 6’5 guard that shot 38% from deep at VMI, could be a good depth piece to provide shooting.
Who’ll provide the offense is the pair of Ivy League stars set to return home. Dingle was one of the top scorers in all of NCAA Basketball last season, averaging 23.4 ppg at Penn en route to earning Ivy League Player of the Year honors. Ledlum wasn’t too far behind him, averaging 18.8 ppg and 8.5 rpg at Harvard. He was a former Tennessee commit out of the portal but is now with the Red Storm as the projected starting forward.
It’s an incredible group of newcomers with great potential for St. John’s, especially when you add Luis and Ejiofor. Luis was a promising freshman player at UMass and could be a future breakout piece to watch, while the former big man and top-40 prospect showed great defensive potential at Kansas and after backing up Soriano for a year, could become the next great big man in the Big East.
Next. 10 biggest position battles to watch for 2023-24. dark
How good the mid-major transfers play at the Big East level will determine how good the Red Storm will be in the first year of the Pitino era. But if we’re just focusing on the roster building in the offseason, it’s safe to say that things are already off to a good start.