Auburn basketball head coach Bruce Pearl is no stranger to the transfer portal. In fact, Pearl spent last offseason essentially building a roster from scratch, with four of the five starters from last season were in their first season on the Plains.
However, the roster for 2022-23 will not be without the veteran returners in Dylan Cardwell, Alan Flanigan, and Jaylin Williams, and the return of K.D. Johnson, Wendell Green Jr., and Zep Jasper. Also on their way in are 2023 signees Chance Westry and Tre Donaldson, and recent commit Yohan Traore.
When it comes to Bruce Pearl’s strategy for rebuilding the roster and looking through the transfer portal, he made it clear that his top priority is to rebuild around the returning members of the team, per AL.com:
"“The biggest thing is on the frontline,” Pearl said. “How can we complement Stretch, Dylan and Jaylin? That’s No. 1. How can we complement those three returning players?… We’ve actually passed on some pretty good players that we just didn’t feel like complemented them… If you’re out there and you’re looking at what happened to Walker and Jabari in a year, Auburn’s a pretty attractive situation. Because both Jabari and Walker made a lot of progress this year. That’s certainly something that’s good to be able to recruit to.”"
Pearl also mentioned that he believes returning guard Jaylin Williams will be a key piece of his squad next season:
"“I expect Jaylin Williams to have a dominant role next year,” Pearl said. “And he is ready. He took one for the team this year, and he competed with Jabari, but Jabari was the best player on the floor every single night.”"
After a historic season on the Plains and the accomplishments of Jabari Smith, Walker Kessler, and the rest of the team, there’s no doubt that Auburn basketball is an attractive program for players in the transfer portal.