Oklahoma added six players from the transfer portal this offseason as Porter Moser prepares to lead the program's transition to the SEC.
Tom Green
Porter Moser and Oklahomabasketball were left searching for answers on Selection Sunday back in March.
The Sooners, with a 20-win season and a tournament-worthy resume, were the first team left out of the NCAA Tournament field by the selection committee. It was the second time in Moser's three years at Oklahoma that his team was among the first left out of the 68-team March Madness field, and while this year's snub wasn't the first time OU has experienced such heartache, it was a particularly stinging moment that left a pit in the stomach of Moser and his players.
"I'll be honest with you — this is where faith comes in, where you look at things in life about falling seven (times), rising eight in life, that old proverb — but Jalon Moore and I talk about it all the time, and Sam (Godwin), I've never been gut-punched more than I was that Selection Sunday, in terms of my professional career," Moser said last week during a radio interview on The Franchise in Oklahoma City."How much work we went into the portal a year ago, to win 20 games — we were 18-6, 13th in the country, then (John) Hugley went down, (Rivaldo) Soares went down, and we still were right there. To not get in, when there were five bid steals, that has to make us stronger."
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But to get stronger from within, Oklahoma basketball first had to go through a breakdown. After missing out on the postseason—and declining an invitation to the NIT—Oklahoma experienced a considerable amount of roster turnover. Three seniors (Soares, Le'Tre Darthard and Maks Klanjscek) graduated, while five players hit the transfer portal: guards Milos Uzan (Houston) and Javian McCollum (Georgia Tech), wing Otega Oweh (Kentucky), Hugley (Xavier) and reserve guard Kaden Cooper (Louisiana Tech).
Moore also explored the NBA Draft, but he assured Moser he'd be back for his senior season, and he eventually withdrew his name from the draft entrant pool and announced his return to Oklahoma last month.
Still, the eight departures meant Oklahoma had to do a near-total rebuild of its roster heading into its first SEC season. While the Sooners already had a pair of 2024 signees coming in with three-star in-state guard Dayton Forsythe and four-star forward Kuol Atak, there were six scholarship spots to fill for the 2024-25 season. That means hitting the transfer portal hard yet again.
Oklahoma basketball's early endeavors in the transfer portal saw the program take some big swings for guys with ties to the state — players like Oklahoma State big man Brandon Garrison, Virginia Tech guard Sean Pedulla and Drake shooting guard Kevin Overton. The Sooners struck out on each, with Garrison landing at Kentucky, Pedulla at Ole Miss and Overton at Texas Tech.
It required a quick pivot for Moser and his staff, who ultimately put together a transfer portal haul of six players, headlined by High Point point guard Duke Miles, Long Beach State guard Jadon Jones and Fairfield wing Brycen Goodine. The Sooners also landed Dayton guard Kobe Elvis, Alabama big Mohamed Wague and JUCO prospect Jeff Nwankwo to round out the portal class.
"The portal, one of the things that's happening, it's like speed-dating," Moser said. "They go in the portal, like 15 schools call them, and recruiting — as I've always done it for 30 years; I'm so relational, selling so many things, outworking people. Now it just comes down to the (NIL) number. People are, right away, 'What's your number?' So, we had to really target what we were able to do. I don't want to expound too much on it, but we were under certain parameters with the NIL. I think we really targeted guys that won — that had won — and that are super efficient."
On the winning front, four of Oklahoma's new transfer additions have been part of teams that made the NCAA Tournament during their careers. It's an influx of postseason experience for a team that last season featured zero players who had experienced March Madness.
Elvis' Dayton team made it to the NCAA Tournament this past season, losing in the second round to Arizona. Jones' Long Beach State program also earned an NCAA Tournament berth this past season, also losing to Arizona in the Big Dance, this time in the first round. Wague was part of Alabama's first-ever Final Four team this year, and the year before he was on a West Virginia team that made the 2023 NCAA Tournament.
Miles has not seen the NCAA Tournament, but he led his High Point squad to a regular-season conference title and 27 wins this year. Nwankwo, who spent the last two seasons at Cowley College, led his program to the second round of the NJCAA Tournament this spring.
"I love that we got some guys (with postseason experience)," Moser said. "…We combined the guys that are coming back with this thing in our belly to drive us — what happened last year — combined with some guys that have been there that want to get back so bad. So, I thought that was intentional with how we put this team together as well."
Moser also pointed to the need for improved scoring efficiency in constructing the Sooners' roster for the upcoming season. Oklahoma finished 50th in the country in adjusted offensive efficiency, according to KenPom, scoring 114.1 points per 100 possessions (adjusted for opponents). Combined with an adjusted defensive efficiency that ranked 36th in Division I, the Sooners had an adjusted efficiency margin of plus-15.77, which was 46th in the country — but not quite enough for a team on the fringe of the NCAA Tournament field.
The Sooners, who also ranked 129th nationally in 3-point shooting (35.1%) last season, hope their new additions can improve that shooting clip and in turn help Oklahoma become a more efficient offense in the SEC.
Jones is a good example of that as a 3-and-D pickup whose range on the perimeter — on both ends of the floor — should help Oklahoma. He shot 37.7% from beyond the arc last season, and the year before he was the Big West Defensive Player of the Year.
"He made 77 3's, 60 steals and 30 blocks (last season)," Moser said of Jones. "There's a crazy stat of the players in the last 30 years that have done that, like Kevin Durant, Mikal Bridges—there's like nine of them. I think he's a great 3-and-D guy, long arms. We recruited to try to play defense, to get turnovers and more 3's this year. That's something I think, with our pace of play, with some guys that can really shoot it or pass it."
Miles, the crown jewel of the Sooners' transfer class, is coming off a season, is a three-level scorer who excels at getting downhill to the rim and averaged 17.5 points per game last season. He shot 67% at the rim while attempting nearly half his shots from that proximity despite being just 6-foot-2. He also shot 36.1% from 3-point range.
Goodine shot 46.7% from deep last season and was one of the nation's best catch-and-shoot perimeter players, knocking down 49% of his catch-and-shoot 3-point attempts. Elvis, meanwhile, shot 37% from deep last season on decent volume (3.8 attempts per game). Nwankwo averaged 18.6 points per game last season at the JUCO level and finished the year on an absolute tear, shooting 46.9% from 3-point range over his final six weeks of gameswhile shooting 37% from deep for the season.
"If you look at all the numbers, Kobe Elvis — and Duke Miles too — is one of the most efficient guards off ball-screens," Moser said. "Jadon Jones, Brycen Goodine are two of the top efficient 3-point shooters in the country. Kobe Elvis was in the top-nine, from last year, coming off ball-screens efficiency-wise. Of those nine, seven of them are gone, either graduated or going to the league. We really targeted efficiency, shooting and winning."
