The transfer portal and NIL era in college basketball is still somewhat of an uncharted territory – despite some coaches and fans pleading for more clarity. However, in the transfer portal, chaos still reigns supreme. 

For some coaches, especially those who are more old school, the rapid transition to this whole new era of college basketball has been difficult. Jay Wright retired abruptly after making the Final Four in 2022, while still being very much in his prime. NCAA title winning Virginia coach Tony Bennett shocked the college basketball world by retiring just a few weeks before 2024-25 season began, saying that he was “equipped to do the job the old way”.

Then there are those who are able to thrive in chaos and the hectic nature of the portal to quickly rebuild or retool their rosters.

Enter Rick Barnes, Tennessee’s 70-year-old coach, who last year made an all-time mid-major transfer pull by bringing in Dalton Knecht from Northern Colorado. Knecht immediately became an offensive engine for a Tennessee team that was known for its hard nosed defense, but often struggled putting the ball in the basket.

Knecht is now a Los Angeles Laker and Barnes had to look for ways to retool a team that was so close to making the Final Four last year. The veteran coach again turned to mid-major schools and by the end of April, he had a commitment from Charlotte forward, Igor Milicic Jr.

Shooting threat

Milicic Jr. comes from a strong basketball background. His father is Igor Milicic, a Croatian-born former player and current coach, who spent some of his best years in Poland and now coaches the Polish men’s national basketball team. As a coach, Milicic Sr. had a remarkable year in 2022, leading the unheralded Poland squad all the way to EuroBasket semifinals.

Meanwhile Milicic Jr. has been representing Poland so far in his career and featured for the senior team in last summer’s Olympic qualification tournaments.

The comparison to Knecht basically ends with both players being great mid-major players who transferred to Tennessee towards the tail-end of their college careers. Unlike the ball-dominant, high volume shooting Knecht, Milicic Jr. is a floor spacing, 6’10″ forward with really nimble feet who can run the floor and protect the rim.

He doesn’t command a super high usage in order to be effective. Per Bart Torvik, his usage rate last year for Charlotte was just under 21%, meaning that Milicic Jr. is more of an off-ball threat. This speaks well for his potential transition to the next level, as he seemingly has the tools to be a long, floor spacing, low-usage forward that NBA teams clamor for.

On offense, Milicic Jr. is first and foremost a shooting threat. Per Synergy, his jump shot ranked in the 88th percentile among all D1 players and 84th percentile in making guarded shots. 

This is not to say that Milicic Jr. is a super tough shot maker in the mold of Ace Bailey, actually, it’s quite the opposite, as Milicic Jr. is mostly a catch-and-shoot threat. But the Tennessee forward has two things really working in his favor: length and a quick release, which make closeouts that much less effective, meaning that his defender has to be super wary every time that he decides to help off Milicic Jr.

With regards to Milicic Jr’s. shooting, another thing really pops out: the 6’10″ forward was an outstanding shooter off one or two dribbles, as his ability to shooti off the dribble ranked him in the 98th percentile. It has to be noted that the sample size was small, as he made 11 of these shots last season, so that’s something to monitor this year.

But you can clearly see flashes of how Milicic Jr. manipulates his catch and shoot ability with pump fakes on closeouts in order to take one or two dribbles and get a great shot instead of a good one.

Potential in Transition

Since Milicic Jr. is the most dangerous from the three point line, where he spends most of his time around the perimeter. That, combined with a slightly tiny frame, means that he is not much of a post-up threat – and he really doesn’t need to be.

At Charlotte, Milicic Jr. played in one of the slowest offenses in division one. Tennessee isn’t the Indiana Pacers in terms of pace either, but they should be able to showcase his transition abilities a bit more than the Charlotte 49ers.

Milicic Jr. is really fast for a 6’10″ forward and Synergy ranks him as “very good” in transition, where he can both attack the basket and pull up from three.

Last year, the forward had a couple of really explosive transition moments. He’s not an amazing vertical athlete, but Milicic Jr. can get to the rim, especially with some help from his teammates, i.e. on ball reversals, where the defense is forced to rotate.

Overall, Milicic Jr. was a very efficient shooter all over the floor, having logged a 61% true shooting percentage and he made an impressive 71% of his shots at the rim. Again, he does an excellent job at leveraging his long distance shooting to get looks at the rim – after getting his defender up in the air, Milicic Jr. has an array of tricks, as he can pull up from mid-range, but also shows some nice footwork with eurosteps and creative, guard-like finishes around the rim which is impressive for a player of his length. 

One area where Milicic Jr. can improve is passing the ball. Last season, he had more turnovers (61) than assists (53). Milicic Jr. spends a good amount of his time on offense swinging the ball around and handing it off to his guards, but due to his frame, the handoffs are not as impactful as they could be in creating space for teammates.

He can sometimes struggle with both processing and execution while passing. In this clip, Milicic Jr. fails to read a rather straightforward situation, not recognizing a rapidly closing passing window and passes it into an area where it’s easily intercepted.

Fluid Defender

As a defender, Milicic Jr’s. advantages are pretty clear – at 6’10″, he’s able to contest shots at a high level, his nimble feet and quickness are major reasons why the forward is really good at closing out

In this clip, look at how Milicic Jr. rotates to help and force a pass out to corner, before quickly flipping his body to close out on a shooter. This is the type of defense that can get you to the NBA – the game is so spread out now that being to able to defend from disadvantage and playing good recovery defense is one of the most important assets on that end of the floor.

I don’t think Milicic Jr. makes for a good defensive anchor, but I don’t think that he needs to be one either. At Tennessee, he’ll have the safety net in the form of Felix Okpara, a 6’11″, 235 lb center transfer from Ohio State, who, per Bart Torvik, had a block percentage of 9.7, good enough for 21st in the entire nation.

This means that Milicic Jr. will be free to function as a help defender most of the time, which I think is by far his best role, as he doesn’t have particularly great abilities defending in drop coverage, or the strength to bruise with the best big men in the SEC.

Milicic Jr. is good at both altering and blocking shots himself, allowing a respectable 0.94 points per shot at the rim. His physical attributes mean that Milicic Jr. can be a very effective defender in transition.

However, he can get exposed on drives by stronger players, especially when help isn’t there at the rim. In this clip, Mark Mitchell of Duke doesn’t have too many problems in getting to the rim and carving out space under the basket with Milicic Jr. defending him.

Overall, I think Milicic Jr. is the type of player that will fit pretty seamlessly in Tennessees’s roster. Coach Barnes preaches defense and toughness and, despite Milicic Jr. clearly being a positive defender, there will be a lot he can learn in Knoxville. The step up in competition will be pretty significant, Igor’s game is very much scalable to the SEC and, in the future, maybe even to the NBA.