Closing the window (a bit)

NCAA moves to shorten when players can enter the portal, and will change spring recruiting calendar. Plus, a heart-warming story and Illinois adds a guard.

Author

Mike Miller
October 05, 2023

After weeks of hand-wringing, Kentucky finally got Croatian center Zvonimir Ivisic admitted to school. This takes a little pressure off big men Aaron Bradshaw and Ugonna Onyenso to rush back from injuries. And also ensures the admissions department stops getting all those rude anonymous messages. Probably.

Let's get to the rest of Wednesday’s news.

1. NCAA tightens transfer window, grad rules, tweaks coaching calendar

Changes are coming to the transfer window. And to the recruiting calendar. And to social media (kinda, I’ll explain later). And most of it makes sense, which is a welcome change from some of the usual NCAA moves.

The NCAA Division I Council approved multiple changes on Wednesday, the most significant of which applies to when student-athletes can enter the transfer portal. They had 60 days this year. In 2024, it’ll be just over six weeks.

In men's and women's basketball, the windows will open for 45 days the Monday after Selection Sunday.

"In both men's and women's basketball, the council determined that a 45-day window that concludes on or before May 1 best enables coaches to understand their current rosters, provides stability for student-athletes remaining at the school as they prepare for summer basketball, and encourages student-athletes who intend to transfer to do so before final exams at their current schools and summer school application deadlines at most campuses," said Lynda Tealer, chair of the council and deputy athletics director at Florida. "Moving forward, we will continue to evaluate the impact of transfer windows on student-athletes, coaches and athletics programs."

The NCAA noted that 61% of student-athletes who transferred did so within the first 30 days. There were reports that the NCAA would move it to 30 days. That wasn’t the case.

"We had every argument for 30 days," one source told CBS Sports. "Men's basketball was against [45]. ... The men's basketball student-athlete engagement group favored a 30-day window after the second round."

The portal still opens the day after Selection Sunday — the one aspect that still needs revised given many teams are preparing for the NCAA Tournament, the NIT or the CBI. Not only should the attention be on those events, but it’s also a challenge for the coaches to prep their teams and spend time on the portal.

Another important change: Grad transfers can’t make a move anytime they want.

The council also heard from the Legislative Committee on an update to graduate transfer waiver guidelines. The Legislative Committee noted that notification-of-transfer deadlines of May 1 for fall and winter sports and July 1 for spring sports apply to graduate transfers transferring for the first time, and that beginning in 2024-25, graduate students seeking waivers for postgraduate eligibility will need to comply with those same deadlines.

The council expressed support for the current transfer waiver guidelines for student-athletes who have transferred multiple times as undergraduate students.

It’s unclear if this will apply to student-athletes taking summer school courses to graduate.

As for the recruiting calendar, the April evaluation period is gone. That’s now a time when coaches can focus on the transfer portal. It’s a major change (and one the coaches pushed for). The June recruiting weekends are likely to stay in place, per CBS Sports.

Coaches are still waiting for that true “dead period” so they aren’t working year round, but that’ll have to wait until 2025.

Lastly, the NCAA says no more photoshoots for prospective recruits. Where that leaves the the Joe Tiptons of the world (and people like me, searching for images during the long, slow summer), I don’t know. But I’m guessing we’ll see some ingenuity emerge. Maybe this is where AI takes over.

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2. Bigger than basketball

It’s that time of year when you’re probably spending all your time reading college basketball previews that offer analysis or projections. You’re seeking insights into the season, and wondering who’ll start, and who the new faces to watch will be.

But sometimes, you read something that isn’t a preview. You get to read something that focuses on life outside of basketball.

The squat one-story building seems to rise from the ground, colored the same as the golden earth beneath it. Structurally, it is simple. Archways carved out serve as open-air windows, and long wooden tables and chairs fill the rooms. There is, however, so much more to the Mady Sissoko Foundation School than what meets the eye. Within its walls lies the one thing people in Tangafoya crave but often can’t find. “People there, they don’t have the opportunities,’’ Sissoko says. “I got an opportunity. Ever since I came to the United States, I wanted to give that back.’’

Sissoko is sitting in the recruiting reception area upstairs at the Breslin Center. The largesse of an American athlete’s life sprawls around him – private tables to study, big-screen TVs to watch, games to play and even a cook to prepare meals. It is a life to which Sissoko has grown accustomed, even if it is not the life he imagined. At best, he thought, he might follow his oldest brother, Modibo, to France and find a job as he did, at a pharmaceutical company.

He did not think, at 22, he’d be funding his village’s first school, establishing a well to provide people their first drops of running water and even an irrigation system to help with the farming. He could not envision a world where he could foster future dreams to help his community — next a tractor, who knows, maybe, someday, a hospital.

People have previously written about Michigan State center Mady Sissoko and his efforts to support his community back in Mali. He spoke about it last season when officials broke ground on the school. It opened in September, with four classrooms that can serve 60 to 70 students at a time.

There isn’t significant new news here, just a heart-warming story from Dana O’Neil about how a 22-year-old college student has raised “quite a lot” more than $50,000. And he did it with NIL.

Anyway. Go read the whole article. And then you’ll probably find yourself cheering for Sissoko this season, if you weren’t already.

3. Illinois adds third ‘24 commit. Can he play point?

Brad Underwood’s spent the last few years trying to find the right guard to run his offense. Did he finally find an option on Wednesday in 2024 prospect Jase Butler?

The 3-star prospect from California isn’t a natural point guard. He’s a combo guard, which sounds a lot like most of the guards Illinois has used the last few years. But the 6-4 Butler, who chose Illinois over Stanford, UCSB and San Francisco, sounds pretty confident.

"They need a point guard," he told 247 Sports. "Someone that can create for others and he wasn't guaranteeing me anything but he said as soon as I come in I will have an opportunity to compete, play right away and he wants to win a National Championship and thinks he can do that with me.

"I think I am a high IQ guard, I am big for the position...I can take advantages of mismatches, I can create for my teammates but I can also knock down open shots, I can get to my spots.”

Butler joins forwards Morez Johnson and Jason Jakstys as part of Illinois’ 2024 class.

In other 2024 recruiting news:

Staying the course

Virginia rose to national prominence in the 2010s — and won a LOT of games along the way — by recruiting players it could develop into exactly what coach Tony Bennett needed for his playing style. Namely, smart, active players who can defend for long stretches and have the patience to work for high-value shots. Are those players still out there in the transfer window era? Can this approach still work? The DTF guys debate.

Links as you look for something better to do than watch the Bears on TNF.

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