Kansas has taken its share of portal swings over the years, and not all of them have landed. For Bill Self, the transfer market has been one of the few places where the Jayhawks haven’t always found the kind of certainty they wanted. Looking back, there are a handful of departures that stand out as losses KU could still feel.
At No. 5 is Bryson Tiller, the 2026 power forward whose freshman season hinted at more than the box score fully showed. He put up 7.9 points and 6.1 rebounds, but those numbers don’t quite capture why he arrived as a 5-star recruit. Tiller never turned into a finished product in Lawrence, yet the upside was obvious enough that Kansas would have liked to see the rest of that development happen in a Jayhawk uniform.
No. 4 is Rylan Griffen, a guard from the 2025 class who arrived with real momentum after a strong sophomore year at Alabama. He had averaged 11.2 points, 3.4 rebounds and 1.9 assists there, but his lone season at Kansas never matched that level.
His field goal percentage fell from 45.4% to 37.2%, and his scoring dipped by about five points per game. Griffen then moved on to Texas A&M and quickly looked more like the player Alabama had gotten, finishing with 11.2 points, 2.5 assists, 2.7 rebounds and 1.6 steals.
Even with his role at KU up in the air, the Jayhawks still lost production they could have used on a thin scoring team.
AJ Storr lands just ahead of him at No. 3, and the story is strikingly similar. After an excellent sophomore season at Wisconsin, where he averaged nearly 17 points a night on 43.4% shooting and added 3.9 rebounds, Storr came to Kansas and saw his numbers fall sharply.
His points dropped by more than 10 and his field goal rate slid by 5%. He then bounced back at Ole Miss this past season, posting 15.5 points, 3.1 rebounds and about two assists per game.
No. 2 is Flory Bidunga, the center who was recently included on Kansas’ best 5-stars since 2020 list. If he reaches his ceiling with the Louisville Cardinals, he could easily move to the top of this ranking later on. Bidunga’s ability to shut down an offensive possession is hard to measure, and being one of only five 5-stars in the 2026 NCAA Transfer Portal says plenty about the kind of player he is.
At No. 1 sits Zuby Ejiofor, the power forward from the 2023 class. Kansas and St.
John’s met in the round of 32 of the 2026 NCAA Tournament, and the feeling from KU was clear: nobody really wanted him to go. But with Hunter Dickinson set to join the roster, there wasn’t an easy path to a major role over the next couple of seasons, so Ejiofor headed to Rick Pitino and took off.
He was recently picked 23rd overall by the Atlanta Hawks in this year’s NBA Draft, and his final Big East season was a big one: 16.3 points per game, 2.1 blocks, 3.5 assists, 1.2 steals and 7.3 rebounds while shooting 53.6% from the field.
In Other News...
Former Jayhawks Are Leaving Vegas With One Big NBA Question
The 2026 NBA Summer League wrapped in Las Vegas with Golden State taking the title over Memphis, but for Kansas fans the more useful scoreboard was the one measuring how former Jayhawks handled their first or latest taste of pro ball. Darryn Peterson was the headliner with Utah, while Hunter Dickinson and Melvin Council Jr. got extended looks with New Orleans, and KJ Adams made his way back onto the floor after rehabbing a torn Achilles. Even Dajuan Harris Jr. found a brief opening with Minnesota, giving the Jayhawks a scattered but interesting cross-section of where their alumni stand right now.
What made the week worth watching was less the final results than the roles each player was asked to fill. Peterson arrived with the kind of attention that follows a top pick, Council turned an undrafted opportunity into real bench minutes, and Adams return offered a small but meaningful checkpoint in his recovery. For Kansas, the bigger question now is how much of this Vegas snapshot carries over once the games count for real and these former Jayhawks settle into the next stage of their NBA paths. [Read more 🡒]
What Summer League Just Told Jayhawks Fans About KU's NBA Hopefuls
The NBA Summer League wrapped up with the Golden State Warriors taking the title, and for Kansas fans it offered a useful snapshot of how a handful of familiar names are trying to carve out their next steps. Seven Jayhawks appeared across different teams and locations, with Darryn Peterson, Hunter Dickinson, Melvin Council Jr., Tre White, Zeke Mayo and KJ Adams all getting a chance to show where they stand against pro competition.
Petersons run with the Utah Jazz was the loudest of the bunch, while Dickinson and Council spent their time with the New Orleans Pelicans and White gave Miami a productive stretch in Las Vegas. Mayo logged his work with Atlanta, and Adams was part of Golden States summer group, giving the Jayhawks a broad mix of early NBA auditions to track even if the results were uneven from player to player. [Read more 🡒]
Tre Lathan Just Sent A Hopeful Signal About Kansas New Defense
Kansas spent the offseason trying to remake a defense that finished 95th last year, and the transfer portal haul reflects how serious the Jayhawks are about fixing it. With 30 new transfers arriving overall and 15 of them on defense, Lance Leipolds sixth season has the feel of a reset, especially for a program still trying to snap its bowl drought and build something sturdier on that side of the ball.
Tre Lathan is one of the players offering an early reason for optimism. The linebacker, who briefly considered leaving before deciding to stay, has liked what he has seen from the newcomers around him, including Quincy Davis, Jibreel Al-Amin, Bam Crouch and TreVon McAlpine. For a defense that needs more than just bodies, the early signs from the room matter, and Lathans read on the group suggests Kansas may have found more than depth in this class. [Read more 🡒]