With guard depth remaining a need for the Texas Longhorns in the NCAA transfer portal, head coach Sean Miller’s program landed a commitment from Tennessee Volunteers transfer guard Amari Evans on Friday after buzz began to build between Evans and the Longhorns on Thursday.
The 6’5, 220-pounder with a 6’10 wingspan has three seasons of eligibility remaining after signing with Rick
Barnes in 2025 as a consensus four-star prospect ranked No. 70 overall in the 247Sports Composite rankings. Miller has a prior relationship with Evans after landing an official visit to Xavier before the Georgia product picked Tennessee. Evans also took an official visit to Pitt and held offers from Georgia, Illinois, Oklahoma State, Ole Miss, TCU, and Texas A&M, among others. Like Miller, Evans is originally from Pittsburgh, but played his high school basketball in Atlanta at Overtime Elite.
Here’s the 247Sports evaluation of Evans out of high school:
Evans is powerful with a muscular build, very long arms (6-foot-10 wingspan), and big hands. In addition to his college ready body, he also has a mature approach. He was an early bloomer physically, who developed a big reputation as an underclassman, in large part because he was often able to overpower the opposition. Within the last year though, his approach and floor game have shown clear and impressive maturation.
He’s really embraced the defensive end of the floor. While his lateral quickness isn’t necessary his best asset, his length, strength, physicality, and competitiveness on that end make him effective. He’s capable of defending multiple positions, being especially switchable up the line-up, and is even active off the ball blowing up dribble hand-offs and being diligently disruptive.
Offensively, he came up the ranks with an aggressive scoring mindset and an ability to get downhill in the open court. He’s become much more efficient within the last year though with his ability to play with and off of other talented players. He’s learned how to space the floor, make extra passes, and cut off the ball. He’s also made progress as a spot-up shooter and is starting to show some potential as a pick-and-roll threat on the second side of the floor.
While he may lack some wiggle and elite explosiveness, Evans other physical tools enable him to play multiple positions too. As his guard skills continue to progress, that versatility will only expand. He also offers plenty of intangibles with his work-ethic, maturity, competitiveness, and potential leadership ability.
In Knoxville, Evans appeared in 35 games, starting two, averaging 4.1 points, 3.1 rebounds, and 0.9 assists in 14.4 minutes per game. A strong finisher, defender, and defensive rebounder, Evans shot just 22 percent from three and 57.5 percent from the free-throw line as a freshman, but flashed his upside against Vanderbilt with a career-high 24 points on 9-of-18 shooting, adding six rebounds and three steals. Evans also reached double digits with 14 points against South Carolina State and 16 points against Arkansas.
Evans is the third transfer portal addition for Texas, joining former Colorado guard Isaiah Johnson and former TCU forward David Punch.
