Miami basketball named top 15 biggest transfer portal winners

The Miami basketball team was ranked 13th in the "NCAA Basketball: Top 25 team winners from 2024 transfer portal results" published by Tristan Freeman of Busting Brackets on Saturday morning. Miami had a huge exodus and influx of transfers for the 2024-25 season. Jim Larranaga has utilized transfers throughout his Miami tenure.

Miami brought in six transfers to replace the seven outgoing players in the portal. The Hurricanes also signed the eighth-ranked 2024 recruiting class. Five-star 2024 shooting guard Jalil Bethea is a projected 2025 NBA Lottery Pick. Miami should be extremely deep on the perimeter in 2024-25.

Forward Matthew Cleveland and guards Paul Djobet and Nijel Pack are the only returnees from the 2023-24 Miami basketball team. Cleveland and Pack were starters last season. Pack is the only returnee from the 2023 Miami Final Four team. The previous two seasons could not have been any different.

Miami was hindered by injuries and seemingly a lack of chemistry in 2023-24. Cleveland missed three games last season and Pack was out for seven. The incoming recruiting and transfer classes should provide Miami with more depth in 2024-25. Freeman examined some of the roster moves for Miami.

"13. Miami Hurricanes
The Hurricanes are a great example of the positives and negatives of the transfer portal. They lost several players, including a trio of starters (Norchad Omier, Bensley Joseph, and Wooga Poplar), as well as a bunch of players coming off the bench.

The team also landed four transfers, including three likely starters, for next season. The first two transfers came in the frontcourt in Lynn Kidd and Brandon Johnson. One of the top scorers to hit the portal was Jalen Blackmon, a 6’3 guard (from) Stetson. Joining him is a late pickup of AJ Staton-McCray...from Samford.

Coach Jim Larranaga has a good history of getting the most out of transfers, including the core that went to the Final Four a couple of years ago. He’ll have to do the same with this group to get back out of the ACC’s basement."

- Tristan Freeman, Busting Brackets

In addition to the players mentioned by Freeman, Miami added depth in the frontcourt with forwards Yussif Basa-Ama from Yale and Kiree Huie from Idaho State. Basa-Ama played in only 13 games for Yale as the Bulldogs advanced to the second round of the 2024 NCAA Tournament.

Huie averaged 11.3 points, 5.8 rebounds and 1.2 blocks per game in 34 appearances with 32 starts for Idaho State during the 2023-24 season. At 6'9 and 220 pounds, Huie and Kidd provide Miami with size on the interior they did not have for the last two seasons. Miami finished 12th in the ACC with 75 blocks in conference games last season.

Kidd averaged 13.2 points and 6.5 rebounds while leading the ACC with a 66.8 field goal percentage. Johnson and Kidd were recently named two of the best pure fits by position nationally by 247Sports. Johnson provides Miami with a true power forward and Kidd its first true center since Nysier Brooks in 2021-22.

Blackmon is an explosive scorer with 20 20-point games and occasions and eclipsed 30 points five times. Led by 43 points from Blackmon in the Atlantic Sun Championship game, Stetson beat Austin Peay to advance to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history.

Bethea and Stanton-McCray provide Miami with a backcourt off the bench that would start for most college programs. Stanton-McCray averaged 11.5 points and 4.5 rebounds in 2023-24 with 18 games scoring in double-digits. After shooting under 30 percent on three-point attempts entering the season, Stanton-McCray shot 41.3 percent in 2023-24.

The additions Miami made through the transfer portal have completely remade their roster. Miami has a good combination of returnees in the rotation with Cleveland and Pack, freshmen led by Bethea and transfers who should receive significant minutes in 2024-25. The 2023-24 season should go down as an aberration in Miami history,

Miami has been able to attract transfers with a strong NIL, the success of the runs in the 2022 and 2023 NCAA Tournaments and as one of the best programs in the ACC in the last few seasons. The Hurricanes should continue to be an enticing destination for transfers for the foreseeable future.