Monday proves to be a busy day of transfers for Colorado men's hoops
Monday has thus far proved to be a busy day for Colorado, as before noon news broke that four players entered the NCAA Transfer Portal. Seniors D'Shawn Schwartz, Dallas Walton and Alexander Strating plus walk-on freshman Isaac Jessup all have hit the portal.
With the departures of Schwartz, Walton and Strating, coupled with McKinley Wright IV's long-pronounced intentions not to take advantage of his free year of NCAA-granted eligibility and return to Colorado for another year, Jeriah Horne and Maddox Daniels are the two remaining scholarship seniors whose intentions ahead of this upcoming season are unknown.
If neither of them opt to return, Colorado has two open scholarships to use on the transfer market in competing a 13-man roster for the 2021-2022 campaign. The Buffs currently have 11 players on scholarship for next year.
In Colorado's NCAA Tournament victory over Georgetown, Schwartz became the 37th player in program history to score 1,000 career points, dropping 18 against the Hoyas.
A former four-star recruit from Colorado Springs, Schwartz became the third member of Colorado's 2017 class, behind Wright IV and Tyler Bey, to achieve the milestone.
Schwartz averaged over nine points per game for the Buffaloes in his sophomore, junior and senior campaigns and was a regular three-point sharpshooter, leading the team in converted long balls in 2019-2020.
Fans will doubtless never forget Schwartz's game-winning, buzzer-beating three-pointer against Dayton in December of 2019 that lifted the Buffs over the No. 13-ranked Flyers in Chicago.
Schwartz also scored the game-winning backset on a tip-in dunk against Southern California in this year;'s Pac-12 Tournament semifinals game.
For Walton, resiliency defined his career. Dating back to his time at Arvada West High School, he overcame a total of three ACL tears, starting 23 games for CU this past fall.
The 7-footer averaged 6.5 points per game and shot 55% from the field in his final campaign with Colorado.
Senior season highlights for Walton included dropping 22 points in a 92-69 win over Washington on Dec. 20 as well as contributing nine points against Georgetown in CU's first NCAA Tournament victory since 2012.
As a freshman, Walton notably went toe to toe with future No. 1 overall NBA Draft pick DeAndre Ayton, scoring 15 points and shooting 7-of-7 from the floor in an upset of No. 14 Arizona on Jan. 6, 2018.
Strating accepted a lesser role with the Buffs this past season with grace, as his minutes went down from 8.0 as a sophomore, to 3.4 in 2019-2020 to 2.4 as a senior.
He appeared in 10 games for Colorado last season but fans will likely remember a solid, off-the-bench performance he contributed during the 2018-2019 season, scoring a career-high 10 points in a Pac-12 Tournament quarterfinals win over Oregon State on March 14, 2019.
The final player to hit the transfer portal Monday was Jessup, a freshman walk-on from Loveland (Resurrection Catholic). He appeared in four games for the Buffaloes last season.
