rocketeli
01-21-2018, 07:19 PM
Thinking about transfers
Seems like every time a Duke men’s basketball player transfers we can count on a certain segment of the fandom to either:
React as if they were personally turned down for the prom/had their puppy kicked and see this as some kind of dark referendum on the quality of Duke basketball.
Start hand wringing and talking about kids today and how Duke has just so many, many more transfers than anyone else.
Well, I can’t do much about the first one (maybe therapy would help?) but maybe a few facts will address the falsity of the strange meme that somehow Duke has an excessive or unusual number of transfers, as this is in fact incorrect. (Naw, what am I thinking, this is the internet…but I can’t stop now.)
Transfers in 2017
(Data extracted from verbalcommits.com)
In 2017
The following schools had 4 players transfer:
Alabama State, Albany, American, Austin Peay, Bethune-Cookman, Bradley, Charleston Southern, Eastern Michigan, Fairleigh-Dickinson, Florida Gulf Coast, Fresno State, Hawaii, George Washington, Idaho, Illinois State, Kent State, Long Beach State, Loyola Marymount, Manhattan, Miami Ohio, North Florida, Northern Arizona, Northern Colorado, Northern Illinois, Northwestern State, Ole Miss, Ohio, Ohio State, Savannah State, Southern, San Jose State, SMU, Texas Southern
Wow, must be something wrong with all of them, right?
Well check out these schools, they had 5 players transfer, all in 2017.
Cal State Northridge, UNC Charlotte, UT Chattanooga, UNLV, Pepperdine, Colorado State, George Mason, Jacksonville State, Chicago State, Lafayette, North Dakota State, Maryland-Eastern Shore, Morehead State, Nebraska, Robert Morris, Quinnipiac, Youngstown State, Weber State, Southeast Missouri State, St John’s, Tennessee Tech
Well, those guys—they must all be too directional, or too bad, or too good, or too academically rigorous, or not serious enough about academics or in a big city or all out in the country or something, surely it couldn’t be much worse?
Well, here’s a list of schools that had 6 TRANSFERS in 2017:
Arizona State (Hi, Mr. Hurley!) Delaware State, Memphis, Maine, Texas-Rio Grande Valley, Fairfield, Texas State, Rice, Seton Hall, Portland, New Orleans, Mississippi Valley State, Missouri, New Mexico, Mount St Mary’s, Pittsburgh, North Texas
Can it get worse? Sure!
Schools with 7 PLAYERS transferring out in 2017:
Cleveland State (the players must know how mad the NCAA is with UNC), UT Martin, Massachusetts, South Florida, Pacific, UTEP
And the highest “achievers”—8 PLAYERS GONE in 2017
New Mexico State, Western Kentucky, Florida Atlantic, Akron
Schools with 2 or 3 transfer are simply too numerous to list, but Kansas and Gonzaga had 3 in 2017 in case you’re interested.
If you’re poring over the list at verbal commits, you realize that players transfer from big name programs and bottom feeders, from small private schools and big state schools, from the city and from the country, from the North and from the South, from academically rigorous programs and some less so, they transfer “up” “down” and laterally and in fact other players are cheerfully transferring into the schools they just left.
But, but that’s AKRON…you say, what about Duke’s peer programs? -that’s what’s important! So, looking at the ACC…
ACC transfers 2011-12 to 2016-17 (data extracted from verbalcommits.com)
School 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 total
BC 2 1 2 3 4 3 15
Clemson 0 2 3 1 1 2 9
Duke 1 0 1 2 1 2 7
FSU 1 2 1 1 2 0 7
GT 3 2 2 1 0 1 9
Louisville 4 3 2 4 1 3 15*
Miami 0 1 1 3 1 2 8
ND 1 0 0 1 0 1 3
NCS 3 1 2 2 2 0 10
Pitt 1 4 0 4 0 6 15
Syracuse 0 0 0 3 2 0 6
UNC 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
VA 0 2 1 1 0 3 7
VT 3 1 5 2 2 2 15
WFU 3 1 3 3 5 1 16
total 22 20 23 31 21 27 143
*see breakdown below
Transfers from the rest of the teams (not ACC) from a “top 16” list of best programs in the 21st century from Sporting News (http://www.sportingnews.com/ncaa-basketball/list/top-college-basketball-teams-2016-21st-century-duke-north-carolina-kansas-kentucky-michigan-state-connecticut-syracuse/ud5cdhg65jil188rxwhx8lrle/slide/2)
School 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 total
Kansas 2 2 1 1 0 3 10
Conn 2 0 1 2 1 3 9
KY 0 2 0 0 2 0 4
Fla 1 2 1 2 3 1 10
Mich St 0 1 2 0 2 0 6
UCLA 3 3 1 0 1 1 9
Wisc 1 0 1 0 1 1 4
Arizona 1 1 1 1 2 1 7
Mland 2 1 7 0 0 2 12
Vnova 1 3 0 1 0 0 5
Ohio St 2 0 0 0 3 4 9
Texas 1 3 0 2 1 1 8
16 18 15 9 16 17 93
And the remainder of the top 25 week of 1/15/18 (extracted from espn)
Purdue 2 4 1 1 2 1 10
Okla 1 0 2 2 3 2 10
WVA 1 6 2 2 0 0 11
Wich st 1 1 1 3 1 2 9
Texastech 6 3 2 3 5 1 20
Xavier 3 1 2 1 3 0 10
Cinn 0 1 2 3 0 0 6
Auburn 3 4 3 4 2 2 18
Seton ha 1 3 2 3 0 6 15
Tenn 2 2 3 5 2 3 17
TCU 0 1 1 3 2 2 9
Ariz St 4 3 5 4 3 6 25
Gonzaga 3 0 2 1 0 3 8
27 29 28 35 23 28
Quick Thoughts
We don’t know why. A certain number of transfers, over the whole NCAA Division 1 are probably involuntary. (FYI about 20% of Division 1 players transfer each year and about 37% of all students transfer over 6 years, which are not the same thing, but show that transferring is not rare for any college setting.) A transfer decision could be forced, due to conflict with the coaching staff/program, dismissal, academic problems or personal problems. New coaches may clean house, or players decide they don’t fit with the new staff. Unlike football, there are not enough players that the staff can usually get away with overtly running players off, but coaches may make it clear to a player that they are not a major piece and that that’s not likely to change.
On the other hand, the program may be perfectly content with a player, but the player and/or his handlers/family may decide they want to go in a different direction.
Consistently successful programs tend over all to have somewhat fewer transfers than those programs that are less so. Programs in the current top 25 that don’t tend to feature longer term success such as Arizona State, Texas Tech, Seton Hall and Auburn all have higher transfer figures, for example.
This, I think, is both intuitive and counterintuitive. Intuitive in that the successful programs are better funded, better run, more stable, and can be more choosey in recruiting so they don’t have to take players that may be risky academically or socially. Counterintuitive in that every top-level program probably has a few people riding the pine that could start and even star for a lesser program, yet they stay.
UNC, as much as Louisville, is an outlier. Why?
Mostly just statistics. Transfers are relatively rare, individualistic events.
Is it playing time? It’s playing time isn’t it?
Some more stats from sports-reference.com to address the playing time issue
This is looking at conference game stats—by the time conference play is going most ACC coaches are going to quit fooling around with their line-ups and there are fewer blow outs etc. to skew the data.
Table 1 Number of players average 10+ minutes in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 8 6 7 8 8 8 7.5
UNC 9 8 10 7 6 8 8.0
Average number of minutes for top 5 players in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 32.1 33.9 31.6 28.8 31.4 28.5 31.6
UNC 31.6 28.1 28.6 28.5 29.6 31 29.3
Number of players averaging 30+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 12
However…
Number of players averaging 29+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 17
Players getting 20 min+ per game
Duke 38
UNC 30
Players getting 10+ minutes a game
Duke 45
UNC 48
Conclusion: UNC plays a very slightly broader range of players than Duke in conference play but the difference is much less than you might think. This makes sense as both coaches are very successful and successful player usage tends to fall into a rather small continuum of number of players and minutes played.
Duke’s top five minute getters for example averaged 2.3 minutes more TOTAL per game than UNC’s—basically about 35 seconds per player. UNC players more players in the 10-15 minute range, but Duke has many more in the 20+ minute range.
The other outlier is Louisville in that it is a very successful program (at least until the events of this year and hadn’t had any coaching changes etc. (until this year) up over these six years has put up transfer numbers similar to BC, WFU and Pitt.
How are their usage rates?
Let’s add L’ville to our stats
Table 1 Number of players average 10+ minutes in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 8 6 7 8 8 8 7.5
UNC 9 8 10 7 6 8 8.0
Lville 9 9 7 8 8 8 8.1
Average number of minutes for top 5 players in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 32.1 33.9 31.6 28.8 31.4 28.5 31.6
UNC 31.6 28.1 28.6 28.5 29.6 31 29.3
Lville 27.8 27.5 31.2 27.2 29.6 31.5 29.1
Number of players averaging 30+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 12
Lville 12
Number of players averaging 29+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 17
Lville 14
Players getting 20 min+ per game
Duke 38
UNC 30
Lville 29
Players getting 10+ minutes a game
Duke 45
UNC 48
Lville 49
So Louisville’s numbers are very similar to UNC’s, and they may actually go the deepest of these three teams, and yet Louisville has had what I can only call a plethora of transfers during the same time that UNC had none. So player usage patterns may not be the answer (or the only answer) as to why.
So why? Why does UNC have no transfers during this time?
I think a lot it is just chance/probability. You have a relatively rare event and some years you get 2 or 3 occurrences and some years you get none. (As an aside, one of the trials of a military career is you cannot make the organization understand this, and anytime something unfortunate happens you all have to rush about like headless chickens coming up with “reasons” and “solutions” that probably have nothing to do with anything and just add work and complications to everyone’s day.) UNC may have just thrown a coin and gotten 6 tails in row.
An example: both Rasheed Sulaimon and P.J. Hairston were thrown off their respective teams. But because Sulaimon transferred to Maryland and Hairston decided to go pro, only one gets recorded as a transfer.
During this time frame UNC did not recruit any classes so stellar that someone already on the team was likely to say “Whelp, it’s over, with what’s coming in I’m never going to move forward, better get now while the going’s good.”
And if you had hopes of a one and done that didn’t happen what do you do next? UNC is a fun place and one of the top 5 programs in the NCAA, so where are you going to go? If you transfer, that automatically makes you a three and done. Your even less likely at this point to achieve in the public (and NBA) eye if you go to the d league (oops, g league) or overseas.
It’s also interesting that the two most cult-like programs (UNC and Notre Dame) had only 3 transfers between them.
At UNC basketball is king, queen and jack as well as ace, emperor or what have you. Although a sizeable portion of their fanbase has indicated their willingness to surplant basketball with football, this hasn’t happened yet. Players are treated like gods, all their and their family’s needs are met and of course, as we know, they don’t have to worry about academics.
To enter the world of UNC basketball fandom is to enter a powerful reality distortion field where everything, from Saint Michael and Saint Dean to the blessed Roy shines with a pure light of goodness. If you’re a believer yourself, as many UNC players are, why would you leave the mother church?
Of course, many of the same things apply to Duke.
Overall, I’d put UNC streak down to chance, chance, recruits with lower expectations and strong emotional investment in UNC, a well-run program, and chance.
*And what’s going on with Louisville?
Is Louisville more willing to take a chance on recruits that may have less ability to negotiate at college career? Are there players less satisfied? Did they leave under duress or of their own free will?
Here is a closer look at L’ville transfers
2017
Jay Henderson walk-on who started at St John’s and left after a coaching change, played a couple of minutes a game at Louisville for two seasons—unclear where he will go next, at least to the internet-his twitter feed makes it clear that being a basketball player is a big part of his identity so who knows?
Tyler Sharpe walk on who played only a few minutes in his one year at Louisville. Was a fairly successful high school player and transferred to Western Kentucky
Matz Stockman reserve 7 footer who spent 3 years at Louisville and averaged 5.3 minutes in 45 games—transferred to Minnesota for his final year of eligibility.
2016
Dillon Avare walk on with very limited usage who got his degree in 3 years (using 2 years of basketball eligibility) and transferred to a scholarship at Eastern Kentucky –last year was his best year averaging 26.2 minutes and 6.5 points
2015
Shaqquan Aaron Played as freshman reserve, struggled with defense, was underweight and coaching staff wasn’t happy and he felt he had been recruited over when Louisville signed Damion Lee, he asked for release after his freshman year and transferred to USC has played two years there-his best year was his first when he averaged 20.8 minutes a game and 7.6 points
Akoy Agua 2 years of very limited usage at Louisville then transferred to Georgetown for a year where he had his best season with 15 mpg and about 4 and ½ points and rebounds then played(minimally) a graduate year at SMU. He claimed his true love was Nebraska, but all three times they weren’t interested!
Trent Gilbert walk on (who turned down scholarship offers)who played a few minutes and left the program after a semester planning to attend community college (maybe ended up at Georgetown College)
Anton Gill 4 star recruit who was a star in high school but never got on track at Louisville (his best year was 9.4 minutes and 2.5 points) and transferred after two years to Nebraska where his best year is this one so far: 23.3 mpg and 9.5 pts.
2014
Chase Behanan was kicked off team for drug use issues, listed as transferring to Colorado State, but decided to go pro instead and went undrafted. A key part of their 2013 title team but usage declined his jr season
Kevin Ware famously fractured his leg against Duke in the NCAAs. He had had a few bumps in the road at Louisville, but left in good standing—he just couldn’t take being around the people, reminders etc. of the accident. He transferred to Georgia State and now plays overseas.
2013
Michael Baffour walk-on played very sparingly, transferred to Benedict College in SC, apparently played no more Div I basketball
Angel Nunez one season, played very rarely, and had a concussion, transferred to Gonzaga in search of more playing time, which he didn’t really get, and after two seasons at Gonzaga transferred to South Florida
Zach Price transferred to Missouri, where he was thrown off the team after he stalked and attacked a teammate, ended up at Winthrop. At Louisville played mostly as a little used sub –did get to start 6 games as a soph including one against Duke due to injuries.
2012
Rakeem Buckles played a high of 18.8 minutes a game as a soph, minutes went down as a jr and he transferred to Florida International where he averaged 30 minutes a game (and about 14 points) for his senior season
Mark Jackson Jr walk on redshirt, transferred to Manhattan where he played one season after his second year, little used at Louisville
Elisha Justice walk on who got scholarship later, back up point guard, played sparingly, but did fairly well-left after freshman year to be close to relative with cancer, and transferred to NAIA university of Pikesville
Jared Swopshire played three years at Louisville, best season was soph played 25 minutes and averaged 7.5 pts, minutes were halved in jr year and he transferred to Northwestern where he played 32.5 minutes a game and averaged 9.7 pts during his one season there.
This breakdown is instructive in that it shows that the raw data can be misleading, and sometimes just wrong
Summing up
Walk-ons who left/transferred—6
One guy (Ware) who left because of the sequelae of a gruesome injury
One guy who actually didn’t transfer, after he was kicked off the team, but went pro
5 guys who left because playing time/program wasn’t meeting their expectations
2 guys who were very limited big men who may have wanted more opportunities
So, subtracting the guy who didn’t actually transfer and the walk-ons then Louisville has 8 transfers in this period, which is much more in line with other top ACC teams.
Anyway TL;DR, elevator summary…Duke has an average number of transfers for a school of its ilk—not the highest and not the lowest. Duke’s transfers seem to happen for the same reasons as at other schools: A guy kicked off the team, a very limited big man going to another program after finish his degree, and 5 guys who felt they could get more minutes or a more suitable role at another school. And remember, transfers aren’t all bad—sometimes they can help a school get rid of a problematic person and sometimes they allow a player to go to a program that’s a much better fit for them—a win/win in fact.
(FYI re walk-ons: UNC doesn’t have any transfers from their walk-ons because they, with very few exceptions are upperclassmen who played their first two years on the junior varsity team, which apparently UNC still has. Smart! UNC, btw is the only ACC school with a JV team. According to Wikipedia the team plays 14-18 games a season against military academy basketball schools, Div 2 and 3 and community colleges. Good luck going to see them though, as the actual schedule of games appears to be a secret.)
Seems like every time a Duke men’s basketball player transfers we can count on a certain segment of the fandom to either:
React as if they were personally turned down for the prom/had their puppy kicked and see this as some kind of dark referendum on the quality of Duke basketball.
Start hand wringing and talking about kids today and how Duke has just so many, many more transfers than anyone else.
Well, I can’t do much about the first one (maybe therapy would help?) but maybe a few facts will address the falsity of the strange meme that somehow Duke has an excessive or unusual number of transfers, as this is in fact incorrect. (Naw, what am I thinking, this is the internet…but I can’t stop now.)
Transfers in 2017
(Data extracted from verbalcommits.com)
In 2017
The following schools had 4 players transfer:
Alabama State, Albany, American, Austin Peay, Bethune-Cookman, Bradley, Charleston Southern, Eastern Michigan, Fairleigh-Dickinson, Florida Gulf Coast, Fresno State, Hawaii, George Washington, Idaho, Illinois State, Kent State, Long Beach State, Loyola Marymount, Manhattan, Miami Ohio, North Florida, Northern Arizona, Northern Colorado, Northern Illinois, Northwestern State, Ole Miss, Ohio, Ohio State, Savannah State, Southern, San Jose State, SMU, Texas Southern
Wow, must be something wrong with all of them, right?
Well check out these schools, they had 5 players transfer, all in 2017.
Cal State Northridge, UNC Charlotte, UT Chattanooga, UNLV, Pepperdine, Colorado State, George Mason, Jacksonville State, Chicago State, Lafayette, North Dakota State, Maryland-Eastern Shore, Morehead State, Nebraska, Robert Morris, Quinnipiac, Youngstown State, Weber State, Southeast Missouri State, St John’s, Tennessee Tech
Well, those guys—they must all be too directional, or too bad, or too good, or too academically rigorous, or not serious enough about academics or in a big city or all out in the country or something, surely it couldn’t be much worse?
Well, here’s a list of schools that had 6 TRANSFERS in 2017:
Arizona State (Hi, Mr. Hurley!) Delaware State, Memphis, Maine, Texas-Rio Grande Valley, Fairfield, Texas State, Rice, Seton Hall, Portland, New Orleans, Mississippi Valley State, Missouri, New Mexico, Mount St Mary’s, Pittsburgh, North Texas
Can it get worse? Sure!
Schools with 7 PLAYERS transferring out in 2017:
Cleveland State (the players must know how mad the NCAA is with UNC), UT Martin, Massachusetts, South Florida, Pacific, UTEP
And the highest “achievers”—8 PLAYERS GONE in 2017
New Mexico State, Western Kentucky, Florida Atlantic, Akron
Schools with 2 or 3 transfer are simply too numerous to list, but Kansas and Gonzaga had 3 in 2017 in case you’re interested.
If you’re poring over the list at verbal commits, you realize that players transfer from big name programs and bottom feeders, from small private schools and big state schools, from the city and from the country, from the North and from the South, from academically rigorous programs and some less so, they transfer “up” “down” and laterally and in fact other players are cheerfully transferring into the schools they just left.
But, but that’s AKRON…you say, what about Duke’s peer programs? -that’s what’s important! So, looking at the ACC…
ACC transfers 2011-12 to 2016-17 (data extracted from verbalcommits.com)
School 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 total
BC 2 1 2 3 4 3 15
Clemson 0 2 3 1 1 2 9
Duke 1 0 1 2 1 2 7
FSU 1 2 1 1 2 0 7
GT 3 2 2 1 0 1 9
Louisville 4 3 2 4 1 3 15*
Miami 0 1 1 3 1 2 8
ND 1 0 0 1 0 1 3
NCS 3 1 2 2 2 0 10
Pitt 1 4 0 4 0 6 15
Syracuse 0 0 0 3 2 0 6
UNC 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
VA 0 2 1 1 0 3 7
VT 3 1 5 2 2 2 15
WFU 3 1 3 3 5 1 16
total 22 20 23 31 21 27 143
*see breakdown below
Transfers from the rest of the teams (not ACC) from a “top 16” list of best programs in the 21st century from Sporting News (http://www.sportingnews.com/ncaa-basketball/list/top-college-basketball-teams-2016-21st-century-duke-north-carolina-kansas-kentucky-michigan-state-connecticut-syracuse/ud5cdhg65jil188rxwhx8lrle/slide/2)
School 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 total
Kansas 2 2 1 1 0 3 10
Conn 2 0 1 2 1 3 9
KY 0 2 0 0 2 0 4
Fla 1 2 1 2 3 1 10
Mich St 0 1 2 0 2 0 6
UCLA 3 3 1 0 1 1 9
Wisc 1 0 1 0 1 1 4
Arizona 1 1 1 1 2 1 7
Mland 2 1 7 0 0 2 12
Vnova 1 3 0 1 0 0 5
Ohio St 2 0 0 0 3 4 9
Texas 1 3 0 2 1 1 8
16 18 15 9 16 17 93
And the remainder of the top 25 week of 1/15/18 (extracted from espn)
Purdue 2 4 1 1 2 1 10
Okla 1 0 2 2 3 2 10
WVA 1 6 2 2 0 0 11
Wich st 1 1 1 3 1 2 9
Texastech 6 3 2 3 5 1 20
Xavier 3 1 2 1 3 0 10
Cinn 0 1 2 3 0 0 6
Auburn 3 4 3 4 2 2 18
Seton ha 1 3 2 3 0 6 15
Tenn 2 2 3 5 2 3 17
TCU 0 1 1 3 2 2 9
Ariz St 4 3 5 4 3 6 25
Gonzaga 3 0 2 1 0 3 8
27 29 28 35 23 28
Quick Thoughts
We don’t know why. A certain number of transfers, over the whole NCAA Division 1 are probably involuntary. (FYI about 20% of Division 1 players transfer each year and about 37% of all students transfer over 6 years, which are not the same thing, but show that transferring is not rare for any college setting.) A transfer decision could be forced, due to conflict with the coaching staff/program, dismissal, academic problems or personal problems. New coaches may clean house, or players decide they don’t fit with the new staff. Unlike football, there are not enough players that the staff can usually get away with overtly running players off, but coaches may make it clear to a player that they are not a major piece and that that’s not likely to change.
On the other hand, the program may be perfectly content with a player, but the player and/or his handlers/family may decide they want to go in a different direction.
Consistently successful programs tend over all to have somewhat fewer transfers than those programs that are less so. Programs in the current top 25 that don’t tend to feature longer term success such as Arizona State, Texas Tech, Seton Hall and Auburn all have higher transfer figures, for example.
This, I think, is both intuitive and counterintuitive. Intuitive in that the successful programs are better funded, better run, more stable, and can be more choosey in recruiting so they don’t have to take players that may be risky academically or socially. Counterintuitive in that every top-level program probably has a few people riding the pine that could start and even star for a lesser program, yet they stay.
UNC, as much as Louisville, is an outlier. Why?
Mostly just statistics. Transfers are relatively rare, individualistic events.
Is it playing time? It’s playing time isn’t it?
Some more stats from sports-reference.com to address the playing time issue
This is looking at conference game stats—by the time conference play is going most ACC coaches are going to quit fooling around with their line-ups and there are fewer blow outs etc. to skew the data.
Table 1 Number of players average 10+ minutes in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 8 6 7 8 8 8 7.5
UNC 9 8 10 7 6 8 8.0
Average number of minutes for top 5 players in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 32.1 33.9 31.6 28.8 31.4 28.5 31.6
UNC 31.6 28.1 28.6 28.5 29.6 31 29.3
Number of players averaging 30+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 12
However…
Number of players averaging 29+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 17
Players getting 20 min+ per game
Duke 38
UNC 30
Players getting 10+ minutes a game
Duke 45
UNC 48
Conclusion: UNC plays a very slightly broader range of players than Duke in conference play but the difference is much less than you might think. This makes sense as both coaches are very successful and successful player usage tends to fall into a rather small continuum of number of players and minutes played.
Duke’s top five minute getters for example averaged 2.3 minutes more TOTAL per game than UNC’s—basically about 35 seconds per player. UNC players more players in the 10-15 minute range, but Duke has many more in the 20+ minute range.
The other outlier is Louisville in that it is a very successful program (at least until the events of this year and hadn’t had any coaching changes etc. (until this year) up over these six years has put up transfer numbers similar to BC, WFU and Pitt.
How are their usage rates?
Let’s add L’ville to our stats
Table 1 Number of players average 10+ minutes in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 8 6 7 8 8 8 7.5
UNC 9 8 10 7 6 8 8.0
Lville 9 9 7 8 8 8 8.1
Average number of minutes for top 5 players in conference games
16-17 15-16 14-15 13-14 12-13 11-12 Average
Duke 32.1 33.9 31.6 28.8 31.4 28.5 31.6
UNC 31.6 28.1 28.6 28.5 29.6 31 29.3
Lville 27.8 27.5 31.2 27.2 29.6 31.5 29.1
Number of players averaging 30+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 12
Lville 12
Number of players averaging 29+ minutes a game
Duke 19
UNC 17
Lville 14
Players getting 20 min+ per game
Duke 38
UNC 30
Lville 29
Players getting 10+ minutes a game
Duke 45
UNC 48
Lville 49
So Louisville’s numbers are very similar to UNC’s, and they may actually go the deepest of these three teams, and yet Louisville has had what I can only call a plethora of transfers during the same time that UNC had none. So player usage patterns may not be the answer (or the only answer) as to why.
So why? Why does UNC have no transfers during this time?
I think a lot it is just chance/probability. You have a relatively rare event and some years you get 2 or 3 occurrences and some years you get none. (As an aside, one of the trials of a military career is you cannot make the organization understand this, and anytime something unfortunate happens you all have to rush about like headless chickens coming up with “reasons” and “solutions” that probably have nothing to do with anything and just add work and complications to everyone’s day.) UNC may have just thrown a coin and gotten 6 tails in row.
An example: both Rasheed Sulaimon and P.J. Hairston were thrown off their respective teams. But because Sulaimon transferred to Maryland and Hairston decided to go pro, only one gets recorded as a transfer.
During this time frame UNC did not recruit any classes so stellar that someone already on the team was likely to say “Whelp, it’s over, with what’s coming in I’m never going to move forward, better get now while the going’s good.”
And if you had hopes of a one and done that didn’t happen what do you do next? UNC is a fun place and one of the top 5 programs in the NCAA, so where are you going to go? If you transfer, that automatically makes you a three and done. Your even less likely at this point to achieve in the public (and NBA) eye if you go to the d league (oops, g league) or overseas.
It’s also interesting that the two most cult-like programs (UNC and Notre Dame) had only 3 transfers between them.
At UNC basketball is king, queen and jack as well as ace, emperor or what have you. Although a sizeable portion of their fanbase has indicated their willingness to surplant basketball with football, this hasn’t happened yet. Players are treated like gods, all their and their family’s needs are met and of course, as we know, they don’t have to worry about academics.
To enter the world of UNC basketball fandom is to enter a powerful reality distortion field where everything, from Saint Michael and Saint Dean to the blessed Roy shines with a pure light of goodness. If you’re a believer yourself, as many UNC players are, why would you leave the mother church?
Of course, many of the same things apply to Duke.
Overall, I’d put UNC streak down to chance, chance, recruits with lower expectations and strong emotional investment in UNC, a well-run program, and chance.
*And what’s going on with Louisville?
Is Louisville more willing to take a chance on recruits that may have less ability to negotiate at college career? Are there players less satisfied? Did they leave under duress or of their own free will?
Here is a closer look at L’ville transfers
2017
Jay Henderson walk-on who started at St John’s and left after a coaching change, played a couple of minutes a game at Louisville for two seasons—unclear where he will go next, at least to the internet-his twitter feed makes it clear that being a basketball player is a big part of his identity so who knows?
Tyler Sharpe walk on who played only a few minutes in his one year at Louisville. Was a fairly successful high school player and transferred to Western Kentucky
Matz Stockman reserve 7 footer who spent 3 years at Louisville and averaged 5.3 minutes in 45 games—transferred to Minnesota for his final year of eligibility.
2016
Dillon Avare walk on with very limited usage who got his degree in 3 years (using 2 years of basketball eligibility) and transferred to a scholarship at Eastern Kentucky –last year was his best year averaging 26.2 minutes and 6.5 points
2015
Shaqquan Aaron Played as freshman reserve, struggled with defense, was underweight and coaching staff wasn’t happy and he felt he had been recruited over when Louisville signed Damion Lee, he asked for release after his freshman year and transferred to USC has played two years there-his best year was his first when he averaged 20.8 minutes a game and 7.6 points
Akoy Agua 2 years of very limited usage at Louisville then transferred to Georgetown for a year where he had his best season with 15 mpg and about 4 and ½ points and rebounds then played(minimally) a graduate year at SMU. He claimed his true love was Nebraska, but all three times they weren’t interested!
Trent Gilbert walk on (who turned down scholarship offers)who played a few minutes and left the program after a semester planning to attend community college (maybe ended up at Georgetown College)
Anton Gill 4 star recruit who was a star in high school but never got on track at Louisville (his best year was 9.4 minutes and 2.5 points) and transferred after two years to Nebraska where his best year is this one so far: 23.3 mpg and 9.5 pts.
2014
Chase Behanan was kicked off team for drug use issues, listed as transferring to Colorado State, but decided to go pro instead and went undrafted. A key part of their 2013 title team but usage declined his jr season
Kevin Ware famously fractured his leg against Duke in the NCAAs. He had had a few bumps in the road at Louisville, but left in good standing—he just couldn’t take being around the people, reminders etc. of the accident. He transferred to Georgia State and now plays overseas.
2013
Michael Baffour walk-on played very sparingly, transferred to Benedict College in SC, apparently played no more Div I basketball
Angel Nunez one season, played very rarely, and had a concussion, transferred to Gonzaga in search of more playing time, which he didn’t really get, and after two seasons at Gonzaga transferred to South Florida
Zach Price transferred to Missouri, where he was thrown off the team after he stalked and attacked a teammate, ended up at Winthrop. At Louisville played mostly as a little used sub –did get to start 6 games as a soph including one against Duke due to injuries.
2012
Rakeem Buckles played a high of 18.8 minutes a game as a soph, minutes went down as a jr and he transferred to Florida International where he averaged 30 minutes a game (and about 14 points) for his senior season
Mark Jackson Jr walk on redshirt, transferred to Manhattan where he played one season after his second year, little used at Louisville
Elisha Justice walk on who got scholarship later, back up point guard, played sparingly, but did fairly well-left after freshman year to be close to relative with cancer, and transferred to NAIA university of Pikesville
Jared Swopshire played three years at Louisville, best season was soph played 25 minutes and averaged 7.5 pts, minutes were halved in jr year and he transferred to Northwestern where he played 32.5 minutes a game and averaged 9.7 pts during his one season there.
This breakdown is instructive in that it shows that the raw data can be misleading, and sometimes just wrong
Summing up
Walk-ons who left/transferred—6
One guy (Ware) who left because of the sequelae of a gruesome injury
One guy who actually didn’t transfer, after he was kicked off the team, but went pro
5 guys who left because playing time/program wasn’t meeting their expectations
2 guys who were very limited big men who may have wanted more opportunities
So, subtracting the guy who didn’t actually transfer and the walk-ons then Louisville has 8 transfers in this period, which is much more in line with other top ACC teams.
Anyway TL;DR, elevator summary…Duke has an average number of transfers for a school of its ilk—not the highest and not the lowest. Duke’s transfers seem to happen for the same reasons as at other schools: A guy kicked off the team, a very limited big man going to another program after finish his degree, and 5 guys who felt they could get more minutes or a more suitable role at another school. And remember, transfers aren’t all bad—sometimes they can help a school get rid of a problematic person and sometimes they allow a player to go to a program that’s a much better fit for them—a win/win in fact.
(FYI re walk-ons: UNC doesn’t have any transfers from their walk-ons because they, with very few exceptions are upperclassmen who played their first two years on the junior varsity team, which apparently UNC still has. Smart! UNC, btw is the only ACC school with a JV team. According to Wikipedia the team plays 14-18 games a season against military academy basketball schools, Div 2 and 3 and community colleges. Good luck going to see them though, as the actual schedule of games appears to be a secret.)