While the transfer portal has become a key part of collegiate sports, this season has seen plenty of underwhelming college basketball transfers. Many transfers came in with enormous expectations but have struggled in the first half of the season. These players have all proven their abilities, but have transferred into a worse situation for their on-court success.
The Four Most Underwhelming College Basketball Transfers
4. Jeremy Roach
Baylor’s success over the last 10 years has relied heavily on stellar guard play. Former Duke point guard Jeremy Roach hoped to follow this tradition. He even stated that he wanted to evolve his game from a scoring guard into a true, distributing point guard. Baylor fans must be disappointed with the team’s struggle thus far, and Roach has played his part in these struggles. He is averaging only 11.7 points per game and 3.5 assists per game. Even more surprising is that freshman teammate Rob Wright has outshined him at the point guard position. For Baylor’s sake, hopefully Roach rights the ship and helps the Bears make a postseason push.
3. Aidan Mahaney
The former Saint Mary’s guard transferred into UConn after two excellent seasons as a Gael. Although the West Coast Conference is not as strong as other conferences, Aiden Mahaney was essentially the best, or second-best, guard in the conference for two years, and helped the Gales earn a five seed in back-to-back NCAA tournaments.
After landing Mahaney, it seemed that UConn had filled their hole at point guard after losing All-American Tristen Newton to the NBA. Unfortunately, Mahaney has not panned out for the Huskies, who start Hassan Diarra instead. Diarra is a solid player, but Mahaney feels underappreciated with his 13.5 minutes per game. He has shown some spurts of his ability in various games, but he has not taken over as the next great UConn guard as some fans hoped.
2. Johnell Davis
After putting his name in the transfer portal, Johnell Davis was arguably the most sought-after transfer in college basketball. The former Florida Atlantic guard was expected to take the reins of John Calipari’s freshly constructed Arkansas roster. Although he has dealt with a wrist injury for a portion of the college basketball season, Davis is shooting a poor 40 percent from the field, the worst of his career by a mile. Before getting hurt, freshman Boogie Fland had completely usurped Davis as the lead scoring guard for the Razorbacks. With Fland likely out the rest of the year and Davis getting healthier, maybe he can turn his season around.
1. AJ Storr
Kansas came into the college basketball season with arguably the most impressive crop of transfers, highlighted by former Wisconsin and All-Big 10 Second Team forward AJ Storr. Jayhawks fans were thrilled to land Storr, who was named to the 2025 Wooden Award Preseason Top 50 List. College basketball fans feared that adding Storr to the solidified trio of Hunter Dickinson, Dajuan Harris Jr., and KJ Adams would create a “big four” that would dominate opponents.
Luckily for the rest of the country, Bill Self is using Storr as a rotational player at best. He is averaging a dismal 17 minutes per game and 6.6 PPG, and he has yet to make an impact in any game. It is unclear whether Storr is just struggling on the court or adjusting to a new system slower than expected, but he is too talented of a player to sit on the bench as much as he does.
Main Image: James Snook-Imagn Images
