College basketball transfer portal open for business hours after Selection Sunday

The college basketball transfer portal is officially open for business hours after Selection Sunday.

That’s the reality programs across the country are dealing with this morning. For teams in the Big Dance, odds are high NIL negotiations and portal departures are paused for a week or two. However, every team – even the 68 in the NCAA Tournament – is starting to evaluate talent and make roster management decisions.

In the 2022-23 academic year, 1,842 athletes entered the men’s basketball transfer portal. Due to preliminary injunctions against the NCAA, booster-funded NIL collectives can freely negotiate with athletes before they make commitments and multi-time transfers can play immediately next year without securing a waiver. Those two factors should produce record-high entry numbers.”

“The pre-portal scuttlebutt has been insane, hearing an insanely high number of kids entering,” an ACC assistant texted On3 over the weekend.

What is transfer portal going to cost teams?

Lucrative financial packages, just like the top-level of college football, will be crucial in constructing teams. Ahead of the transfer portal opening in college basketball, On3 spoke with a number of agents and collectives to identify what competitive NIL budgets look like in the sport. Sources told On3 that high majors aim to field a roster with a payroll between $1 and $3 million, with the top spenders pushing more than $4 million.

Sources were torn on whether hefty budgets could buy elite teams. Unlike college football where the top collectives and NIL entities are looking to spend well over eight figures, basketball does not take as much money.

“You can buy a really good lineup, five players, between $800,000 to $1 million,” an agent with multiple clients planning to hit the portal told On3.

Another agent disagreed.

“I don’t think you can buy an NCAA tournament team,” the agent said. “Some of these programs with the biggest NIL collective budgets bought teams that aren’t making the NCAA tournament.”

As one NIL collective operator told On3, every top 25 program spends at least $1 million in basketball between recruiting high school players and the portal, along with roster retention. Multiple collective leaders and agents emphasized the unknown of what’s to come with the NCAA recently halting investigations into third-party NIL entities, opening up the floodgates for negotiations and tampering.

What positions cost the most?

In college football, quarterbacks, EDGEs and offensive tackles typically earn the most collective dollars. Sources told On3 that big men, specifically centers, are the best comparison to quarterbacks as the top-of-the-line earners with the elite earning over $1 million.

“The most valuable positions are generally productive bigs because there just aren’t that many tall enough people in the world, so having productive bigs are harder to come by,” an agent told On3. “I think even backup bigs are hard to come by at the high-major level – guys who can 10 to 15 minutes and produce. There’s just not that many competent, high-major bigs out there. There’s a premium for that.”

Shooters with size are another spot on the hardwood programs will look to identify. Sources told On3 that the price range for point guards varies between $200,000 to $400,000 but always depends on the available funds.

Any athlete who enters the portal is looking to climb up or find a spot that guarantees more playing time. Scouting is more important than ever, sources said, because the top players in the sport leave for the NBA draft after the first season.

“There are a lot of big-time programs looking to get back to relevancy fast and the free agency window is officially open,” a source told On3. “This transfer portal window will be the most intriguing one yet.”

How will transfer portal operate without NCAA oversight?

The NCAA updated its previously circulated memo from December last week providing clarity ahead of the college basketball transfer portal, allowing multi-time transfers who enter the portal this spring to play immediately at a new school in the 2024-25 year without securing a waiver.

The directive comes from a lawsuit in West Virginia against the NCAA’s transfer waiver policy. The NCAA agreed to terms on a preliminary injunction in December, which lasts through the end of the spring sports season. Sources expect a notable uptick in the number of entries over the next 45 days – the transfer portal closes on May 1. Graduate transfers can enter at any time and when a head coach leaves for a new job, a 30-day transfer portal window is triggered.

This portal will be the first test case for collectives to openly negotiate with athletes before they commit. Sources have indicated offer letters and in-person visits from NIL entities could become commonplace. In a landscape where the NCAA continues to push for Congressional assistance, these next few weeks could be the best example of a professionalized model to date.

“The NCAA has no input on how NIL collectives operate, and these organizations have come a long way,” a top basketball collective leader told On3. “They are going to be involved in this college basketball transfer portal window and there is a group of them who are prepared to win now.”