Missouri forward Ronnie DeGray enters NCAA Transfer Portal

Missouri forward Ronnie DeGray III has entered the Transfer Portal, according to On3’s Jamie Shaw. DeGray spent the last two seasons with the Tigers after playing at UMass as a freshman. He averaged 8.3 points for Mizzou in 2022 but just 2.1 this season before missing the second half of the year with a knee injury.

DeGray’s two-year stint in Columbia was just sort of odd. He came in following a strong season for the Tigers in 2021 where they made the NCAA Tournament behind great guard play in the form of Xavier Pinson and Dru Smith along with a terrific big man in Jeremiah Tilmon. But after those guys left, Missouri was dreadful in 2022 and head coach Cuanzo Martin was ousted just one year after a tourney appearance.

With new coach Dennis Gates came more three pointers and smaller lineups — sometimes detrimentally small in the athletic SEC — and Ronnie DeGray’s role shrunk. Then, the injury happened and he missed the second half of the year, essentially. When he wasn’t getting a ton of playing time anyway and wasn’t a great fit in the Gates system, a transfer makes sense.

He’ll likely look to a path to more playing time wherever he does land after a tough year individually in CoMo.

To keep up with the latest players on the move, check out On3’s Transfer Portal wire. 

Transfer portal background information

The NCAA Transfer Portal, which covers every NCAA sport at the Division I, II and III levels, is a private database with names of student-athletes who wish to transfer. It is not accessible to the public.

The process of entering the portal is done through a school’s compliance office. Once a player provides written notification of an intent to transfer, the office enters the player’s name in the database and everything is off and running. The compliance office has 48 hours to comply with the player’s request and that request cannot be refused.

Once a player’s name shows up in the portal, other schools can contact the player. Players can change their minds at any point and withdraw from the portal. However, once a player enters the portal, the current scholarship no longer has to be honored. In other words, if a player enters the portal but decides to stay, the school is not obligated to provide a scholarship anymore.

The database is a normal database, sortable by a variety of topics, including (of course) sport and name. A player’s individual entry includes basic details such as contact info, whether the player was on scholarship and whether the player is transferring as a graduate student.

A player can ask that a “do not contact” tag be placed on the report. In those instances, the players don’t want to be contacted by schools unless they’ve initiated the communication.

The portal has been around since Oct. 15, 2018 and the new calendar cycle within the portal begins each August. For example, the 2021-22 cycle started Aug. 1. During the 2020-21 cycle, 2,626 FBS football players entered the transfer portal (including walk-ons). That comes after 1,681 entered during the 2019-20 cycle and 1,709 during the abbreviated 2018-19 cycle. In comparison, 1,833 Division I basketball players entered the portal during the 2020-21 cycle after totals of 1,020 in 2019-20 and 1,063 in 2018-19.