USF men's basketball program emptied as final players enter transfer portal

Happy USF men's basketball Transfer Portal Day -- at least for all who celebrate.

The portal officially opened at midnight Tuesday and freshman guard Gavin Hightower became the ninth Bull to enter. The other eight players had announced their intentions to enter. With Hightower's impending departure, new coach Chris Mack offically (at least) has no players on the USF roster.

That will change soon, of course, when Mack begins to sign replacements. But unless one or more of the USF players who entered the portal change their mind, the Bulls will have a completely different roster next season.

One possible future Bull is someone very familiar with Mack.

That would be 7-foot-2 Christian Reeves, who spent time at Duke and Clemson before playing last season at the College of Charleston for Mack. He averaged 11.1PPG, 7.8RPG and 1.4BPG this season.

Interestingly, he played for Charleston last season against the Bulls in USF's 81-75 win. Reeves played only 13 minutes that night, enough time to score five points and grab six rebounds.

He made little impact in 2022-23 at Duke, and missed the following season after ankle surgery. He played 29 games for Clemson in 2024-25 but averaged only five minutes per game. After a slow start last year at Charleston, Reeves made significant improvement throughout the year.

If Reeves comes to Tampa, he could give the Bulls a rim protector and inside force. As the saying goes, you can't teach size. And if you watched much of the Final Four, the games turned on the inside play of Michigan and UConn,

Hightower's departure was not unexpected, not when eight of his teammates had already declared for the portal. He joins Wes Enis, CJ Brown, De`Ante Green, Xavier Brown, Adriel Nyorha, Tristan Beckford, Onyx Nnani, and Caleb Sanders in the portal.

The remaining six Bulls from this season's team - Izaiyah Nelson, Joseph Pinion, Josh Omojafo, Isaiah Jones, Daimion Collins, and Devin Haid -- exhausted their eligibility.

While Hightower's stats weren't necessarily eye-popping, anyone who watched him could see that he made an increasingly large contribution to the Bulls as the season wound on.

With the need for so many replacements, can USF find enough reinforcements?

It shouldn't be a problem.

Green, Gold and Bold will keep you updated as events unfold.