With the recent announcement by Payton Dastrup that he’s transferring to Oregon State, let’s look at the best players that transferred from BYU Basketball.
Since Dave Rose became BYU Basketball’s head coach in 2005, he’s lost players to injury, more focus on school, transferring, and more. That’s not unusual for a college basketball program.
When you look at transfers in specific, 16 players have transferred from BYU since Rose took over. That’s 16 players in 13 years.
Not even that statistic is particularly alarming. What is alarming, however, is that more than half of those transfers have come within the past five years.
On the flip side, the Cougars have brought in a lot of talented transfers, but that’s a different thought for another day.
Payton Dastrup is the latest transfer. A few weeks ago he announced his intention to transfer, and this week he announced where he’ll go – Oregon State.
The Cougars will miss his talent, and more importantly his attitude. In fact, looking back, they’d probably like to have the talents of many of the players they lost to transfers.
So lets create an All-Transfer Team of players who have transferred from BYU under Dave Rose.
We’ll base this off of the players’ production after leaving the Cougars, with one notable exception.
Honorable Mentions
Guard – Demarcus Harrison
Harrison came to BYU as a 4-star prospect, and played on year for the Cougars, averaging 3.2 points and 1 assist in 2011-12.
After that season, he planned to go on a mission, but ultimately didn’t. BYU had filled his roster spot already, so he went elsewhere.
He ended up at Clemson, playing his final three years in his home state. Harrison gradually improved his game each season, and ended up starting 20+ games in both his junior and senior seasons.
As a senior, he averaged 7.9 points and 2.9 rebounds for a middle-of-the-pack ACC team.
Guard – Jake Toolson
The nephew of Danny Ainge, Toolson had offers from Arizona State, Boston College, and St. Mary’s, among others.
As a freshman in 2014-15, he saw action in 26 games, but his sophomore year was cut short due to injury. He’d started five of his first ten games before injury. After that season, he transferred to Utah Valley.
He was granted a medical redshirt for his sophomore year, then redshirted in 2016-17. Last season, he started all 32 games for the Wolverines, averaging 11.2 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 3 assists per game.
He’s still got two more years to play, and he’ll look to improve on those numbers as one of UVU’s leaders.
Forward – Jamal Aytes
Aytes originally signed with UNLV, but transferred to BYU without ever playing for the Rebels.
He redshirted due to the transfer, then struggled with injuries in 2014-15, missing that whole season as well and getting a medical redshirt.
Aytes saw limited time in both his sophomore and junior seasons. He still struggled with injury, and never found a fit in Dave Rose’s rotation.
He decided to transfer to Southern Utah for his senior season, where he had a breakout year. Aytes started the final 17 games for the Thunderbirds, averaging 12.7 points and 5.3 rebounds.