Indiana men’s basketball has fully entered its first full offseason under head coach Darian DeVries. The program has been in offseason mode for a few weeks now with roster movement and a new assistant coaching hire, but the transfer portal opening up gives the Hoosiers the chance to rebuild the roster ahead of year two.
Last year, DeVries was focused on assembling both a staff and roster with just a few staffers and one player following him from West Virginia. The resulting roster came with several
flaws that ultimately helped keep the Hoosiers out of the NCAA Tournament. Now DeVries has a fully assembled staff of assistants and staffers to focus solely on roster construction.
With this in mind, we’re going to be taking a look at the transfer portal in the coming days to see which players Indiana could go after. With a near-total roster rebuild underway, the program won’t have a shortage of need.
Potential Indiana transfer portal targets
Forwards
This is an interesting position, for sure, given the flexibility of small and power forwards along with centers, who are sometimes just power forwards an-
Anyway, this is a list of guys who I think are close to being true power forwards who could be interesting in Indiana’s offense. Obviously we need to see a bit more of what DeVries wants from the position at Indiana, or if there is a specific mold, because Tucker DeVries was his power forward for a long time there.
There’s gonna be a separate list for wings, a position DeVries has prioritized with plenty on last year’s roster and two incoming as freshmen in the class of 2026. Now, to the power forwards.
Kwame Evans Jr., Oregon
Evans Jr. already has a visit set to Villanova and things could move quickly there given the nature of the portal but it’s still worth taking a peek and talking about him, because why not.
He’s spent the past three seasons at Oregon, mostly at power forward next to center Nate Bittle, while improving steadily. He averaged 13.3 points, 7.4 rebounds and 2 assists while shooting 45.4% from the field and 30.4% from 3-point range this past season.
Standing at 6’10” with the rebounding numbers you’d expect, he’d provide the kind of size and physicality that the Hoosiers were sorely missing in DeVries’ first season.
Keanu Dawes, Utah
Here’s a neat one. Dawes has shifted over from power forward to center as his career has gone on, but can definitely still play the former spot and might be better suited to do so.
He averaged 12.5 points, 8.8 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game while shooting 54.6% from the field and 31.7% from 3-point range in 30.8 minutes per game this past season. He’s spent the past two seasons with the Utes after starting his career at Rice in 2023-24.
The 3-point shooting numbers may not be DeVries’ ideal, but he’s improved as a rebounder every season despite size limitations.
Sam Orme, Belmont
Orme is an interesting one because he may not necessarily start and there’s an Indiana connection given he’s from Carmel.
He averaged 12.7 points, 5 rebounds and 1.8 assists while shooting 55.9% from the field and 39.7% from 3-point range for Belmont this past season. He wasn’t high up on the Bruins’ list of dudes with a pretty low usage rate, but he’d be in a similar spot at Indiana.
Khani Rooths, Louisville
Last but not least, Rooths. There’s a pre-existing connection with assistant coach Thomas Carr having been hired away from the same position at Louisville.
Rooths has size for sure at 6’10” but saw a similarly limited role in his second season with the Cardinals in 2024-25, averaging 5.3 points, 4.3 rebounds and 1 assist while shooting 44.9% from the field and 22.4% (not ideal) from 3-point range.
He’s on here moreso for the pre-existing connection. If there’s something there, maybe Indiana takes a flier on having him play a similar bench role while seeing if it could mayyybe get a bit more out of him.
