Baseball season may have just begun, but for Cleveland State men’s basketball fans, it’s portal season.
Just like the past few seasons, college basketball has portal news every few minutes. For the CSU men, there are already four players possibly taking their talents to another school next season (according to verbalcommits.com). These four players include Jason Woodrich, Ramar Pryor, Dok Muordar, and Paxton Payne.
Woodrich, a local product from Beachwood (OH), has been a mainstay in the Vikings rotation over the last four seasons. This season, he saw career highs in games played (36), starts (20), minutes per game (21.3), three-point % (.357), and many other stats. Moving forward without the sharp-shooting Woodrich (on top of losing Tristan Enaruna and others) will leave coach Daniyal Robinson with plenty of questions on where to get points next season. On top of that, his hustle will surely be missed by fans as there were many times when he grabbed rebounds out of nowhere or dove on the ground for a loose ball.
Pryor, another local product from St. Vincent-St. Mary’s (OH), will leave after an interesting season. There were times when he played great (14 points against Defiance), times when he was nursing an injury, and times when he looked a bit uncontrolled (fouling out in back-to-back games in November). Pryor was the player many thought would take a huge leap this year, but all these circumstances mean that fans never got to see him fully in the rotation. Hopefully wherever he goes next year lets him play his game and he stays healthy.
Muordar, the 6-11 center from South Sudan, looked to be a big part of the team when KJ DeBrick went down with a season-ending injury early on, but injuries and inconsistent play led to something else. This season, Muordar played in just 10 games for the Vikes for an average of 2.5 minutes.
Payne, son of Steve Payne (Special Assistant to the Head Coach), played in 10 games over the last two years with CSU, including four this season. With him entering the portal, one has to wonder if his dad has a head coaching offer somewhere else.
It’s just the beginning of portal season and the off-season, but CSU already has a lot of questions about what the team is going to look like next year and going forward.
Can they get another star like Enaruna to transfer to the Vikes?
Can guys like redshirt freshman Danny Young step up to fill the scoring gap?
Can CSU keep pace with teams like Oakland, Northern Kentucky, and upstart Green Bay?
Can the Horizon League please stop getting 14-16 seeds in the tournament (please)?
