Love him or not, Arizonaโs latest addition has lifted the Wildcats back into the national menโs college basketball conversation.
Several early Top-25 projections for next season, updated last week when the NCAAโs withdrawal deadline for NBA Draft entrants passed and transfer portal calmed down, had Arizona in the Top 15 after the Wildcats added North Carolina transfer guard Caleb Love to a roster that is now full of depth and experience.
ESPN moved Arizona up from No. 23 to No. 11 while the Athleticโs Seth Davis elevated UA from 22 to 15. CBSโ Gary Parrish now has the Wildcats at No. 16, while SI has them at No. 15 and 247 ranks Arizona at 17.
โThe Wildcats saved their biggest splash for last,โ wrote ESPNโs Jeff Borzello, โlanding North Carolina transfer Caleb Love, one of the best guards in the portal.โ
Love finished off the Wildcatsโ six-player recruiting spree this spring, giving them a proven scorer in the backcourt with a wildly varying efficiency. The 6-foot-4 guard from St. Louis starred in the Tar Heelsโ run to the 2022 Final Four but last season became a symbol of their struggles, taking a third of UNCโs 3-point shots (7.4 per game) and hitting them at only a 29.9% rate.
โCaleb Love to Arizona: Howโs that going to work?โ blared a headline on SB Nationโs Duke Basketball Report. In the accompanying column, JD King wrote that Love was โvery talentedโ but lacked discretion.
โACC fans who got used to watching Love jack up insanely stupid shots from all over the court might wonder: Why would (UA coach) Tommy Lloyd want to take him on?,โ King wrote.
Yet, Love is a former five-star recruit and McDonaldโs high school All-American whom On3 rated the No. 3 player in the transfer portal this spring. Additionally, Rivals had him at No. 9, and even CBS rated Love the 17th-best transfer despite expressing doubts of its own.
โOverall, heโs a talented but glaringly inefficient offensive player who will have a chance to put up big numbers in Arizona coach Tommy Lloydโs high-octane offensive system,โ CBSโ David Cobb wrote, noting Loveโs overall 36.0% career shooting from the floor.
CBS also put departing UA transfer Kerr Kriisa 10 spots higher than Love on its transfer portal rankings, while Rivals had Kriisa at No. 4 and Love at No. 9.
Overall, Arizona ranked 14th nationally and second in the Pac-12 in On3โs team transfer portal rankings, which measure a teamโs overall improvement or lack thereof from portal activity.
That suggests Kriisaโs loss and that of backup wing Adama Bal (Santa Clara) were more than offset by the additions of Love, sophomore guard Jaden Bradley (Alabama) and senior forward Keshad Johnson (San Diego State).
In the player transfer rankings, Bradley was listed at No. 39 by CBS, No. 54 by Rivals and No. 60 by On3. Johnson wasnโt among the 50 transfers CBS ranked, while On3 had him at No. 123.
Then thereโs the quieter fact this spring that, while Arizona lost leading scorer Azuolas Tubelis to the NBA Draft pool, the Wildcats gained back guard Pelle Larsson from the draft and pulled in three more freshmen that are unranked because they are European.
Arizona last fall signed four-star Texas guard KJ Lewis and this spring added Spanish guard Conrad Martinez, Lithuanian forward Paulius Murauskas and Lithuanian 7-footer Motiejus Krivas (Murauskasโ expected addition is not official, however.)
Lewis is expected to be a key backcourt reserve while Murauskas could add some much-needed perimeter shooting after hitting 41.0% from 3-point range in Lithuaniaโs senior league last season.
But no newcomer appears more potentially impactful than Love, who led the Tar Heels in scoring last season and could do the same for the Wildcats next season.
Maybe even in a more efficient fashion, if Love refines his game within the structure of Lloydโs pass-happy, uptempo offense.
Sam Vecenie, an NBA Draft analyst for the Athletic, wrote before Love picked UA that the guard made a good decision to transfer, giving him the ability to find a system that might bring more out of him.
โLove needs to be willing to take a step back, watch some tape and become a more comfortable and confident passer to his teammates,โ Vecenie wrote in March. โLove has a real talent for breaking down defenders and separating from them. Instead of only looking to score out of those situations, he needs to also look to make the right play.
โAll of this is to say that Love has a lot of talent but is a maddening basketball player to watch right now. Genuinely, I think there are real NBA skills in his game. Hopefully, a transfer and a new coaching staff in his ear unlock something for him that clearly wasnโt working anymore at North Carolina.โ