The college basketball transfer portal officially closed on Tuesday night after a month in which over 2,300 Division 1 transfers alone entered the portal.
Of the over 2,000 players in the portal, none of them came from Tennessee basketball players on scholarship. The Vols four scholarship players with eligibility remaining are all returning for next season. Tennessee is the one of two power five teams, along with Duke, with no outgoing transfers and one of just three teams nationally with no outgoing players.
While Tennessee didn’t have a large number of players with more eligibility remaining, it is still a win for Rick Barnes and his staff to get everyone on its 2024-25 team with eligibility remaining back for another year.
“I think it shows how much more we want,” Tennessee forward Cade Phillips said earlier this week. “Me and JP have been to two Elite Eights. Felix has now been to an Elite Eight. It shows that we want more and I think everybody coming back allows us to feel like we can do that. We’ve had guys that have been there and still wanted to come back and still want more and still want to win more. I think that’s just a testament to the guys that we’ve had here and have stayed.”
The Vols bring just four scholarship players back but three of them are centers or power forwards in Felix Okpara, Cade Phillips and JP Estrella. Okpara was Tennessee’s starting center last season, totaling 7.1 points, 6.4 rebounds and 1.7 blocks per game.
Estrella was poised to be Okpara’s backup entering the season before having season-ending foot surgery in late November. Phillips, a more natural power forward, slid over to the center and averaged 4.6 points and 3.5 rebounds in 14.9 minutes per game.
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Despite having three front court players back, Tennessee went out and added Vanderbilt power forward Jaylen Carey to its roster this offseason. That made it very plausible that one of Tennessee’s returning big men would look for more guaranteed playing time in the portal but that didn’t prove to be the case.
“I think it speaks volumes about them that they’re not afraid to compete,” Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes said. “I mean, where they all want to go is all about competitive spirit. They all want to be professional basketball players. And I think they all have (a lot of) confidence. And they want to win. … And they put the team first, they put the program first and they pretty much say, whatever you guys think we need to do, we’re all in with you.”
Tennessee basketball has added one transfer in its backcourt— Maryland point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie as well as prep prospects Amari Evans and Troy Henderson. The Vols also added a starting caliber player on the wing in five-star Nate Ament, the nation’s No. 4 prep prospect.
But the one glaring weak spot on Tennessee’s roster is the shooting guard position. The Vols one returning scholarship player in the backcourt, sophomore combo guard Bishop Boswell, can play the two-spot but Tennessee needs to add shooting and a SEC starting caliber player. Barnes was complimentary of Boswell while meeting with the media earlier this week.
“But the fact is, he’s looking at it now that he knows that we need him to make that big jump,” Barnes said. “He’s worked as hard as anybody on our team since the seasons been over with. He’s probably put more time in the gym than anybody since the season has been over with.”
Tennessee now has three scholarships to work with as it puts together its roster for the 2025-26 season. The Vols need to add two more guards and have versatility with how they use the last spot.
