The NCAA transfer portal is set to close on Tuesday night, as players now have the deadline to enter, making for what could be a hectic final day of portal entries. Now, players only have to enter on Tuesday, not make a decision on where they’re going, but one player who has yet to confirm his return is Wisconsin Badgers star Nolan Winter.
Winter has been Wisconsin’s top priority all offseason long, and the Badgers have been working to put pen to paper. While there has been optimism throughout the offseason that Winter’s deal will eventually get done, there will always be outside pressure until the transfer portal window closes.
Speaking on potential 11th hour transfer portal entries, CBS Sports’s Isaac Trotter gave out a few potential names that teams will be watching for.
“Christian Anderson at Texas Tech is probably the biggest potential free agent on the board right now,” Trotter said. “I think the big thing with him, he’s asking for an enormous payday that nobody wants to pay guards. People like to pay bigs because it really— I think one thing I’ve been really focused on, I feel like bigs improve your floor, and guards kind of control your ceiling. So I think a lot of teams in this cycle are more than comfortable paying up for electric bigs. Christian Anderson’s asking for big man money that point guards are probably not, uh, commanding. So that’s probably a big one to watch.
“I will also add this: any big man with a pulse that is currently connected to their team, I think, is currently a free agent, and their agents are definitely getting hit. You know, one guy that has not announced his decision yet of whether he’s coming back is Nolan Winter from Wisconsin. He’s 7 feet tall, he can shoot threes, he’s a great cutter, multi-positional defender. He’s awesome. We already saw Wisconsin couldn’t get into the John Blackwell sweepstakes of what he could be commanding in the free market. I do expect Winter to be back in Wisconsin next year. I do think that they have optimism that he will sign his deal and return. But if you’re a big man needy team, Nolan Winter would be at the top of my wish list here in the final hours.”
With the transfer portal closing tomorrow, @TravisBranham_ and @Isaac__Trotter are monitoring a prominent guard who could enter at the 11th hour.“He'd definitely be a top-10 player in the portal…” pic.twitter.com/FagPJS0Kdr
When it’s all said and done, it’s still expected that Nolan Winter returns to Wisconsin as the star of next year’s team. Tuesday’s deadline is the major inflection point.