Rick Barnes continues to line up the options.
The mad dash to fill out next season’s Tennessee basketball roster is in high gear, with visits being scheduled all over this week. Rick Barnes has been a busy man after opting to come back for another season, having to replace the bulk of his roster ahead of his 11th season in Knoxville.
Barnes has landed two out of the transfer portal so far — point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie and power forward Jaylen Carey. Several spots in the rotation remain, mainly at shooting guard and small forward.
Tennessee has two more potential options set to see Knoxville soon. D-2 Lincoln Memorial transfer Elyjah Freeman will be in Knoxville on Wednesday, according to On3. The 6-8 wing is coming off of his freshman season where he scored nearly 20 points per game. Freeman made a big impact on the boards too, averaging over nine rebounds per game. He also shot a whopping 46 percent from three-point range.
Rick Barnes went to see Freeman last week, now Freeman will see Knoxville for the first time. Auburn and Indiana are also in the mix here.
Also, according to Rocky Top Insider’s Ryan Schumpert, Kansas transfer Rakease Passmore will be in Knoxville for a visit on Friday. The 6-5 shooting guard was the 50th ranked player in the 2024 cycle, per 247Sports. Passmore spent just one season with the Jayhawks and originally comes out of Asheville, North Carolina.
Passmore only played in mop-up duty this season for Kansas, while also working through injuries and sickness. He was regarded as an ultra-athletic slasher coming out of high school with real ability on the defensive end of the floor. That sounds like a fit for Rick Barnes to me, with potentially three seasons to mold him going forward.
All of this is developing while Tennessee is still throwing on the full-court press towards Nate Ament, the nation’s fourth overall ranked prep prospect. It feels like Tennessee is awaiting an answer there before going forward with much else.