The writing was on the wall that changes were coming for Kansas just moments after the Jayhawks got rocked by Gonzaga in the Round of 32 of the 2024 NCAA Tournament to mercifully end a season that started with them named the preseason’s No. 1 team and deteriorated in a hurry during Big 12 play. A season-ending knee injury for All-American wing Kevin McCullar was the final straw, but Kansas was leaking oil well before that.
“I think for the last month, I’ve been thinking about next season, to be honest,” coach Bill Self said. “Not in the moments during the game, but obviously, we played — we had eight guys on scholarship that were healthy there late. Injuries are part of the game. That’s not an excuse. But we could have done a much better job as a staff of putting more guys out there that we could play. And so that’s something that I’ve thought about for a long time. The thing about it is, in basketball, early on you can play through some things. But the course of a season, there’s a grind that goes with it and bodies get run down, injuries occur. It’s all part of it. When you don’t have as much firepower or that maybe you’ve had in past years, it certainly showed this year.”
Self took responsibility for building a top-heavy roster and vowed to be different. It wasn’t just lip service, either. Self backed it up by accruing one of the best transfer hauls in the country. Even after a devastating season-ending injury to sophomore Elmarko Jackson, Kansas will enter 2024-25 with a fierce nine-man rotation … on paper.
Let’s dive into the scouting reports and realistic expectations for each of KU’s transfer additions.
Sharpshooting wing Rylan Griffen will be on NBA radars if he rises to the challenge defensively.
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Expected role: Starting shooting…
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