Niko Medved received the final commitment in the transfer season from a junior wing, Malachi Palmer.
MALACHI PALMER
Pos: F/G
Ht: 6’6”
Wt: 215
In his final year in prep school, Palmer had multiple offers from schools but ultimately chose Maryland over
Florida State, West Virginia, Oklahoma State and Seton Hall. He played limited minutes over 22 games for the Terps and transferred to Villanova for his sophomore season. For the Wildcats he started four games, played in all 33, averaging 18 minutes, 4.6 points and 1.7 rebounds per game.
Palmer is a physical wing who can guard bigger forwards and has the athleticism to handle smaller guys. This, from SBN’s Villanova site, VUHoops.com…
The sophomore proved to be unafraid of taking big shots late in games. Prior to his role increase, the vast majority of his looks were high percentage. Palmer’s strength allows him to switch onto bigger players, but he’s athletic enough to defend smaller ones. Palmer does a lot of the little things in the hustle departments as well, drawing some comparisons to former Wildcat Jermaine Samuels for both his build and his playstyle. It’s easy to see the potential as he heads into his junior season.
Palmer had a big game against Seton Hall this past February, scoring 15 points, grabbing six rebounds and shot 3/5 from three. And in Nova’s NCAA loss to Utah State he played limited minutes to due to foul trouble, but also shot 3/5 from three and finished with 11 points.
He was a decent shooter this past season, going 28/78 from three for a 36% average. If Coleman can play physical defense and make threes at that rate again, he should find a valuable role in Minnesota.
What is next?
This should complete the roster for Medved. The good news is that this team is going to be significantly deeper and will have plenty of lineup options. The bad news is that playing time is going to be a challenge for some. Palmer is one of the guys on the roster who has some versatility. If the team needs to play “small-ball” he can play more of a PF role and if they need to play big, he can maybe even slide to SG (though this feels less likely). Winters Grade and Nolan Groves can both play SG or SF effectively. And freshman, Nolan Anderson can probably play PF and SF as well.
This will be the 2026-27 roster.
G – Isaac Asuma
G – Kyan Evans
G – Cedric Tomes (FR)
G – Nolan Groves
G – Kai Shinholster
G/F – Winters Grady
G/F – Malachi Palmer
G/F – Nolan Anderson (FR)
F – Bobby Durkin
PF – Jaylen Crocker-Johnson
F/C – Grayson Grove
C – Malick Kordel
C – Chadrack Mpoyi (FR)
More to come on how good we think this team can be, who starts and how to manage our expectations, but we know the names.
