The transfer portal has changed the game of college basketball. Now, the complete rebuild of a roster takes only weeks instead of years.
Texas Tech has certainly taken full advantage of this trend during the portal era. Including this season’s four added transfers, the program has brought in at least four transfers in every offseason since 2021.
In fact, it’s been since 2020 that Tech has signed more high school prospects than transfers. Of course, the Red Raiders aren’t the only program operating that way as schools across the nation are utilizing the transfer portal to immediately fortify their rosters.
With that said, the Big 12 is perhaps the epicenter of the transfer portal craze. So let’s look at the five best transfers that have come into the conference this offseason.
469. . . Tucker DeVries. . Tucker DeVries. Senior. 5. player. Transfers
Tucker DeVries was the key offseason pickup for West Virginia. However, it wasn’t a hard sell for the Mountaineers given that his father, Darian was hired to be the Mountaineers’ new head coach after six seasons as head coach at Drake.
Tucker DeVries is a 6-foot-7 wing who can fill it up. For his career, he’s averaged 18.0 points per game in 104 outings.
That includes 21.6 points per game last season. He also averaged 6.7 rebounds and 3.7 assists in 2023-24.
Named the Missouri Valley Conference’s Player of the Year in each of the past two seasons, he helped Drake reach the NCAA Tournament in 2023 and 2024. (Also helping Drake reach the Big Dance this year was Texas Tech sophomore transfer Kevin Overton.)
Though DeVries is the highest-scoring player on this list, he still has something to prove. Can he carry that scoring success from the mid-major level to the Big 12? Last year, he played no team from a major conference so it will be interesting to see if his game translates to the toughest conference in the nation.
