Millions of dollars are tossed around at teenagers and kids in their early 20s like it’s nothing. Greedy agents, parents and players. Continuity and a college degree are valued like gum on the sole of your shoe.
Those are a few reasons the transfer portal in college basketball has been one of the sport’s main talking points for the last few years. The effects of the transfer portal can be felt at the highest levels of Division I college basketball and at the Division II level in Durango at Fort Lewis College. It’s a double-edged sword and Skyhawks fans saw it first hand last season.
Ten years ago, the transfer portal wasn’t a thing (it wasn’t invented until 2018). Players stayed at the same school, built continuity and graduated with the class they came in with. It was very rare for a player to transfer to another school because they had to sit out a year before they were eligible to play in games. If a player left school, it was to enter the professional ranks.
The transfer portal was invented to simplify the transfer process for college athletes, provide a system for them to declare their intent to transfer and allow coaches to easily contact them.
Now everything has changed. In July 2021, the NCAA passed Name, Image and Likeness (NIL), allowing student-athletes to profit off their name, image and likeness. That, combined with the NCAA allowing student-athletes to transfer unlimited times and have immediate eligibility, led to a transfer frenzy. Everyone wants to get paid and level up, whether it’s from a low-major Division I to a high-major Division I or from Division II to Division I.
The numbers don’t lie. In 2019, 957 players entered the men’s college basketball transfer portal. In 2025, the number is over 2,700.
Now, enter FLC’s men’s and women’s basketball programs. Last offseason for Skyhawks hoops was the perfect example of why the transfer portal is a double-edged sword.
Let’s start with the men’s team. In late April 2024, after Bob Pietrack resigned as head coach, almost every player entered the transfer portal to find a new school. In the past, a lot of those players may have stuck around because they wouldn’t want to sit out a year at a new school. Instead, new head coach Jordan Mast was left with no players who had played the season before because the players from Pietrack’s roster could transfer and play immediately.
Because of the immediate eligibility of the portal, the players on Pietrack’s roster could find a new head coach they liked, a new style they liked and play right away instead of waiting to see if they liked who FLC hired to replace Pietrack.
However, because of the portal, Mast found some talented players, pieced together a roster and had some success in his first season despite not having a full offseason. Who knows if 10 years ago, talented players like Biko Johnson and Chuol Deng would’ve been available for a desperate Mast to scoop up for his team. Johnson and Deng might’ve been discouraged from transferring from their previous schools because players had to sit out a year in the past.
Johnson and Deng are great examples of why the transfer portal can be a success. It allows players who are running low on eligibility to find a good situation to showcase their talent. Johnson went from not playing at Division I University of Nebraska Omaha to having a great season at FLC. He’s since transferred again and will play at Division I University of Idaho after he ran out of Division II eligibility. He has this opportunity because of his great play at FLC, not because of 3.3 points per game at Nebraska Omaha.
The women’s program had a coaching change as well in the 2024 offseason. Taylor Harris resigned and Lauren Zuniga was hired as the head coach. Zuniga had more of a chance to choose to embrace the returning players or her transfer portal additions. She chose the transfer portal players and it didn’t work out in the win and loss columns.
Zuniga had seven players return from Harris’ 2023-2024 roster that finished 12-16 overall and 9-13 in the RMAC. Junior Kate Gallery and senior Avery Evans were key parts of Harris’ competitive squad; Evans was second on the team in minutes and Gallery was third.
Evans never made it into Zuniga’s rotation and left the team after playing only 15 minutes. Gallery played in eight games but saw her playing time dwindle to zero before she left the team.
Zuniga mostly relied on transfer portal players who had little to no experience in the RMAC and the team lost a lot. FLC finished 5-22 overall against Division II teams, 3-17 in the RMAC and lost 13 of its last 14 games.
Luckily for Zuniga and Mast, they are returning solid cores from last year to build upon, which is somewhat rare in today’s college basketball landscape.
But the double-edged sword returns to stab FLC fans in the heart with the Skyhawks’ returning continuity. Say FLC men’s and women’s hoops do really well next year and they both make the NCAA Tournament. That’s a positive, right?
It is, until Division I schools with more money to spend poach the teams’ best players. This will leave the coaches with more recruiting to do for hired mercenaries to use a successful FLC program as a steppingstone
On the flip side, what if the continuity doesn’t work and the girls or guys don’t develop? It’s possible the players hit the portal to find better situations and leave coaches back at square one to start the cycle all over again.
What’s the solution? There isn’t a perfect answer. The cat is out of the bag with NIL and unlimited transfers, so it’ll be very hard to reverse either of those.
The solution might be a change in mindset for Skyhawk fans. You can’t rely on seeing a player grow and develop over multiple years inside Whalen Gymnasium. The sooner fans realize that every player is a free agent and can leave after a year, the more fans should flock to home games to witness this year’s team and players, because nothing is certain for the next year.
Treat players like one-year comets shooting through Durango. You’ll leave Whalen happier you got to see them instead of sad about the confounding state of college athletics.
bkelly@durangoherald.com
