Michigan basketball stands atop On3's team transfer portal rankings
Michigan Wolverines basketball head coach Dusty May and Co. have benefitted from utilizing the NCAA transfer portal more than anyone in the sport so far this offseason. The Maize and Blue currently stand No. 1 in On3’s team transfer portal rankings, which take into account additions and departures.
“On3’s Team Transfer Portal Index utilizes the On3 (P)erformance score to measure a team’s production during the transfer process, compared relative against its roster and not a comparison against other schools,” On3 wrote. “This proprietary algorithm determines if a school has improved its overall team talent, stayed the same, or declined in talent during the transfer window.”
Michigan has an index score of 28, which is ahead of UCLA (26), Louisville (25), Indiana (23), Kansas (22), NC State (19), Ole Miss (19), West Virginia (18), Missouri (16), Arizona State (16) and California (16), all of which make up the top 10 in the rankings.
“Rising star coach Dusty May has put together an elite coaching staff that is quickly making the Wolverines one of the more intriguing teams going into the 2024-25 season,” The Athletic‘s Tobias Bass wrote in naming Michigan one of the transfer portal’s big winners.
Michigan has added six transfers this offseason in guards Tre Donaldson (Auburn), Roddy Gayle Jr. (Ohio State) and Rubin Jones (North Texas), forward Sam Walters (Alabama) and centers Danny Wolf (Yale) and Vladislav Goldin (Florida Atlantic).
Michigan has three players that appear in the top 100 in On3’s transfer portal player rankings. Goldin is No. 4, Wolf is No. 21 and Walters is No. 88.
Donaldson, meanwhile, is the 50th-best point guard and No. 279 overall player in the transfer portal. Gayle ranks No. 132 overall and No. 26 among shooting guards. However, the On3 Industry Rankings — which taken into account opinions of multiple sites — say that Gayle is the 52nd-best player in the portal. Jones is No. 153 overall and No. 29 among shooting guards, per On3.
“I’ve explained to people, we complain about the portal and all these things a lot, and without it, it would be hard to assemble a competitive roster this quickly,” May said on the ‘College Hoops Today’ podcast. “Because of our staff, they’re building to recruit, they’re building to identify the right kind of players and then also have the years and equity and trust and things like that.”
Michigan has lost some talent in the transfer portal, too, but what it has brought in outweighs what it lost. The Wolverines have seen five players enter the portal this offseason in guards Dug McDaniel (committed to Kansas State) and George Washington III (undecided) and forwards Youssef Khayat (Bowling Green), Tarris Reed Jr. (UConn) and Terrance Williams II (undecided, also declared for draft).
McDaniel is the only departing Wolverine in the top 50 in On3’s player rankings (No. 40). Reed joins him in the top 100 at No. 64.
Michigan’s 2024 high school recruiting class ranks 55th in the country and No. 11 in the Big Ten. It includes three guards in four-star Justin Pippen and three-stars Durral Brooks and Lorenzo Cason.
Michigan has at least one scholarship spot to work with as May and Co. continue to build the roster.
“The portal stops for no one, so we have to stay on our toes, but we’re really, really close to having a team that will look like the team we put on the floor in four, five months,” May said.
