Amid a magical postseason run, coach John Calipari doesn't have the luxury of focusing only on this year's Arkansas basketball team.
Instead, he and the rest of the Razorbacks' coaching staff — along with every other program still playing in March — must balance game preparation with offseason roster construction this week.
Coming off the 75-66 NCAA Tournament victory over 2-seed St. John's on Saturday, Calipari must turn his focus to the oncoming storm that is the transfer portal.
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The college basketball transfer portal officially opens Monday and won't close for 30 days, on April 22. No team is safe from roster attrition, and the next few days will be critical in determining who may return for another year in Fayetteville.
"Monday, we're really preparing for a game and having individual meetings about are you coming back? If they put their name in the portal, they probably don't have an option to come back, but, you know, you care about the kids," Calipari said. "At the end of the year, it's all about them. Whatever they choose. You want to go pro? You want to come back? You want to go somewhere else? It's their choice. I have always been that way, but it's getting harder to be that way."
The timing of the portal opening doesn't come at an ideal time for Arkansas, which will play 3-seed Texas Tech on Thursday in San Francisco. Having will-you-stay-or-will-you-go conversations with players, especially in an ever-changing market that's sure to be ramped up a notch this year when it comes to NIL (hello, House Settlement), doesn't exactly play into the "one heartbeat" mantra Calipari and players have mentioned.
But, this is the reality of college athletics, and there are none more equipped to handle it than Calipari, who touched on the topic of roster building after the win over St. John's.
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"We have a couple of really good freshmen coming in," Calipari said. "I'm hoping we get one more and then we have to get in the transfer portal and grab a couple of guys. I'm hoping we get a crew of these guys coming back."
Arkansas already has one non-freshman commitment for next year's team in Lebanese forward Karim Rtail. The Razorbacks also have signatures from five-star prospects Darius Acuff Jr. and Meleek Thomas and four-star Springdale native Isaiah Sealy.
Be sure to tune in to HawgBeat for more coverage of the Arkansas basketball team as it continues its March Madness run.
