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Only patient coaches should test their luck with transfers

spt-111227-rycewhite

Mike Miller

Transfers are a tricky business. When a new coach takes over a program, they’re often an early solution to filling available spots by guys who don’t want to play under the new coach. Or certain coaches take a chance on guys who for some reason didn’t like their original school of choice.

Sometimes they pay off (Syracuse loved Wesley Johnson, while Seton Hall’s finally reaping some rewards from Herb Pope), sometimes not. And sometimes they become the face of a program.

In just his second season, Fred Hoiberg’s trying it at Iowa State (9-3 through Thursday). He has four on the roster, all of whom were either starters are expected to be at their previous schools: Royce White (Minnesota), Chris Allen (Michigan State), Chris Babb (Penn State) and Anthony Booker (Southern Illinois).

Meanwhile, first-year Missouri coach will welcome three potential impact transfers to next season’s active roster in Keion Bell (Pepperdine), Jabari Brown (Orgeon) and Earnest Ross (Auburn).

But will any of these transfers actually pay off? Or are they just taking a huge risk?

Zach Hayes has an interesting article at Rush the Court that takes a look at recent transfers at seven schools. (He admits that limited amount of data shouldn’t be conclusive, but it does provide some insight).

Go read the whole thing to find out more about the players involved and the records, but he notes that it isn’t always about the player so much as it’s the coaching staff who makes the ultimate difference. More interesting is that the it’s often the year after the transfers intiailly become eligible to play that has the biggest payoff.

For Iowa State, that means 2012-13 might be a breakthrough year (though Allen won’t have any more eligibility) and Haith might have to wait until 2013-14 before his guys become a huge part of Mizzou.

Transfers. They’ll test your patience more than once.

You also can follow me on Twitter @MikeMillerNBC.