Gene Frenette: NIL, transfer portal navigation puts JU, UNF hoops programs behind 8-ball

When Jacksonville University basketball coach Jordan Mincy had to go shopping in the transfer portal to replenish a depleted roster, he was confident of landing Merrimack freshman guard Javon Bennett, a player he recruited the previous year out of Orlando Trinity Prep and named Rookie of the Year in the Northeast Conference.

“I thought because we had a prior relationship, we’d get him,” said Mincy.

But when Bennett informed Mincy during Final Four week that he was committing to Dayton, it served as a reminder to the JU coach of what many mid-major basketball programs and FCS football programs with scarce resources are up against when mining the transfer portal.

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Name, image and likeness (NIL) money from schools that can afford to pay up almost always wins out.

“He told me the NIL package [at Dayton] was crazy,” Mincy said of Bennett. “He went to a higher mid-major for an offer he couldn’t turn down. This would have never happened five years ago. It’s a different era.”

For JU hoops and many programs in various sports at the mid-major level that don’t have the money to entice players, the twin arrivals of NIL becoming legal and the transfer portal’s huge expansion since the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 are putting them at a competitive disadvantage.

“It’s the worst,” said Mincy. “You can find players, but it’s a hard search.”

Unfettered college free agency means coaching staffs at non-Power 5 schools, including University of North Florida basketball under Matthew Driscoll, must work harder and smarter to navigate a new recruiting landscape that works more against them than in their favor.

“It’s 100 percent a bidding war,” said Driscoll. “All schools are doing now is shopping a number. Kids can get an NIL offer, have the one-time transfer and play immediately. It was a perfect storm.”

From this point forward, Mincy and Driscoll must go through the annual trepidation of wondering if their best underclassmen players will get poached and bolt for greener pastures.

“I saw where a kid committed to UMass-Lowell on a Friday, decommitted on Monday and then committed to Fresno State,” said Driscoll. “It’s not illegal, it’s legal. I wonder how many Freshmen of the Years from mid-major conferences are still at their schools.

“Everybody does the NIL thing differently [in basketball]. Some schools, everybody gets the same money. At others, the starters get more, and some others, it’s the top eight. We just don’t have the money to do that.”

Dolphins, Ospreys face massive turnover

Both JU and UNF are experiencing roster upheaval like never before. Fans will need a game program to keep track of the new faces.

Mincy has 10 newcomers for the 2023-24 season, pending medical approval for one recruit with a heart condition. Over at UNF, Driscoll will be welcoming eight new additions to his roster, the biggest number in his 15-year tenure.

Five of the Dolphins’ 10 first-year players came from the D-I transfer portal, including Jackson High product Steph Payne from Incarnate Word, and two are junior college transfers.

JU lost both centers with one year of eligibility remaining to the transfer portal, Omar Payne to UCF and Mike Marsh to Oklahoma State. This will be Payne’s fourth D-I school after previous stints at Florida and Illinois.

With more than 1,000 D-I scholarship basketball players entering the portal — after a record 3,284 FBS players did so in football — it's no wonder that more programs than ever are experiencing significant roster turnover, especially at mid-majors where the better players are often lured away by NIL money.

“I started thinking about players leaving probably in January,” said Mincy. “I don’t take it too hard. Every negative, we got to use it for a positive. In recruiting, I tell players, ‘If you play well here, I can get you to the next level.’ Good players are going to leave. It’s happening. Are you going to adjust to it or sit back and complain when it happens? You got to pivot.

“Instead of kids going to the NBA, they’re going to a higher level [basketball program]. Ultimately, they want to get paid. This generation is about money. I got to do my job and be prepared to recruit somebody behind them.”

Driscoll was looking forward to having possibly the best returning backcourt in the ASUN Conference. Then he lost Jose Placier to South Florida and new head coach Amir Abdur-Rahim. On Jan. 5 while still head coach of Kennesaw State, Abdur-Rahim watched UNF’s point guard pour in 32 points and a buzzer-beating 3-pointer on the Owls. Three months later, Placier joined Abdur-Rahim at USF as a graduate transfer.

UNF’s other starting guard, Jarius Hicklen, will be teaming up with Marsh at Oklahoma State. The Ospreys were prepared to lose leading scorer and senior Carter Hendricksen (he signed with Czarni pro team in Poland), but seeing their next three best scorers all leave via the transfer portal — Jonathan Aybar went to FIU — has forced Driscoll to go into full-blown rebuild mode.

It makes him appreciate even more what UNF had when the school’s all-time best players, Dallas Moore and Ponte Vedra High product Beau Beech, had a three-year run together that delivered the greatest success the Ospreys ever had in basketball.

Moore is the school’s all-time leading scorer with 2,437 points and Beech is third with 1,557 points.

“Dallas Moore would have never stayed here [with NIL and transfer portal in place],” said Driscoll. “He would have been gone after his freshman or sophomore year and gotten a big NIL deal with a Power 5 school.

“Schools tried to poach Beech and Moore after their junior years, but they stayed because they would have had to sit out one year back then. Things are different now.”

Dealing with transfer portal reality

Mincy and his coaching staff referred to May 11 as “Doomsday” because it was the last day the basketball transfer portal remained open for the 2023-24 season.

That’s when the JU staff could exhale, knowing they could no longer acquire transfers or lose players to other schools. Mincy was so concerned about losing redshirt sophomore guard Gyasi Powell, a Bishop Snyder High alumnus, to the transfer portal, he approached his third-leading scorer (9.4 points per game) before ASUN play began in January about his future.

“I told him, ‘I know this is a weird time and we’re going into conference play, but what do you think you want to do next year? I need to know. You don’t have to freak out. I don’t care either way, but I want to be prepared,’” said Mincy. “I think that’s the best way to handle it. Just be up front with your players.”

One advantage for JU and UNF is they no longer have to deal with resource-rich Liberty, which is leaving for Conference USA after winning the past five ASUN regular-season titles and three tournament championships. Jacksonville State is also departing, followed by Kennesaw State next year.

Even with a more manageable 12-team league next season, the Dolphins and Ospreys must still be vigilant about roster management because the transfer portal and NIL puts more pressure on mid-major coaches to quickly find replacements.

“We’re going to recruit the best possible players, make them as good as we can, and if something comes their way [with NIL money from other schools], so be it,” Driscoll said. “The portal becomes so critical. You have to watch how many commitments you get.

“Even though we have two scholarships [for the 2024-25 season], we may only take one freshman in the fall because you don’t know who else is going to join that [transfer portal] mix.”

Despite losing good players to the portal, Driscoll sees one ancillary benefit. He can land better high school recruits because Power 5 schools are looking to reload first with D-I transfers. Among the most promising newcomers for UNF is 6-foot-6 Miami Country Day guard Jasai Miles, who will compete immediately for Hicklen’s starting role.

“We would have never gotten a player like Jasai four years ago because he would have either gone to a Power 5 school or a UCF or South Florida as a late signee,” said Driscoll. “High school kids who aren’t elite lose out with the transfer portal because in the spring, everybody is looking to the portal first to get players.”

In the big picture, schools like JU and UNF must deal with the sobering reality that productive players like Hendricksen may no longer stay four years.

When asked how likely it’d be for one of his players to score 1,500 points in his JU career, Mincy replied: “It would take something miraculous for that to happen.”

The NIL and transfer portal has given college athletes more options and freedom than ever before. But it’s also to the detriment of many mid-major programs that will struggle to keep players who develop into stars.

JU and UNF are already paying the price, and will continue to do so, for that new normal.

Gfrenette@jacksonville.com: (904) 359-4540; Follow him on Twitter @genefrenette     

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Roster turnover with NIL, transfer portal tough sledding for JU, UNF hoops