CSU BASKETBALL: Under men’s coach Larry Eustachy, the Rams lost 3.2 players per year to transfers.
College basketball’s nonpower conferences are stocked with transfers. According to Verbalcommits.com, 883 men’s Division I players left their program last season. Of those, 24 landed on Mountain West rosters this season, and all but three teams in the conference — Air Force, San Jose State and Utah State (none) — have at least one transfer. But as many vagabond players the Mountain West takes in, the conference also churns out transfers at an alarming rate.
Easy as it is to point fingers at the high level of player turnover Colorado State has seen under coach Larry Eustachy, who is on administrative leave amidst an investigation into alleged abuse of players and staff members, the Rams aren’t the Mountain West’s worst team when it comes to retention. Since the start of Eustachy’s first season in Fort Collins (2012-13), the Rams have signed 20 players out of high school or junior college, added 11 Division I transfers and have had 16 players leave the program with eligibility remaining for reasons other than turning pro. Three of those players — all in the incoming class of 2014 — never officially joined the team. Only two players (Joe De Ciman and J.D. Paige) have stuck it out with Eustachy at CSU for four years.
The Rams have lost an average of 3.2 players per season under Eustachy, a rate almost three times greater than the five transfers previous CSU coach Tim Miles lost in his four seasons.
A survey of the Mountain West, using data from Verbalcommits.com, shows that those 16 players CSU lost under Eustachy only ties for the conference’s fourthhighest turnover rate since 2012-13. UNLV and Utah State have lost 18 transfers. And although those programs have seen coaching changes during this window that did result in some departures, Rodney Terry has been the coach at Fresno State since 2011 and his Bulldogs have seen 17 players transfer.