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Rice Basketball Recruiting: Owls add transfer Travis Evee from VMI

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Rice basketball hit the Transfer Portal hard this spring, adding former VMI point guard Travis Evee to their roster. He’ll sit one season prior to being eligible for the Owls.

Attrition struck the Rice basketball roster hard this offseason, leaving several holes that need to be filled. Fortunately for the Owls, reinforcements are on the way. Although he won’t suit up for Rice until the 2021-2022 season, incoming transfer Travis Evee has high hopes for his time at South Main.

A transfer from VMI, Evee committed to the Owls in the midst of the coronavirus lockdown. He has yet to step foot on campus or meet the coaching staff in person, obstacles he wouldn’t let stand in the way of finding his way to what he called “the best place for me.”

The Roost Podcast: Listen now to our Extended Offseason Interview Series

The external environment for his decision was far from ideal, but he says he feels confident he made the right choice. Ultimately it came down to relationships. Head coach Scott Pera provided a level of comfort that made Evee confident he was ready to head to Texas.

“I felt Rice was a great place where I can be challenged academically and athletically,” Evee said.

Evee was the Southern Conference Freshman of the Year this past season, leading VMI with 12.6 points per game. He shot 36.2 percent from three, building upon a strong track record of success from deep. Evee set a single-season record in high school with 104 made three-pointers. Shooting is his strong suit, making him a perfect fit for what Pera wants to build at Rice.

On the court, Evee prides himself as being a “team first” player who promises to bring a winning attitude to South Main. Rice basketball will need a facilitator in the future with the graduation of Ako Adams. As soon as he’s able, Evee is ready to step in and fill that role at Rice.

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Erica Ogwumike still in awe of WNBA Draft and Minnesota Lynx future

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Erica Ogwumike has put medical school on hold. The Rice women’s basketball alum will first give pro ball a shot with the WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx.

It’s been a wild few weeks for former Rice women’s basketball guard Erica Ogwumike. One month ago she was a guest on The Roost Podcast where we chatted about the abrupt end of her collegiate career. What would come next, even Ogwumike admits, was something that she hadn’t really started to process.

The WNBA wasn’t brought up in that discussion. Ogwumike says the possibility of being drafted hadn’t really been on her mind. “Honestly, a couple of days before the draft is kind of when it hit, that my name was consistently being out there.”

Then, in the third round of the 2020 WNBA Draft, the New York Liberty selected Ogwumike 26th overall. She was promptly traded to the Minnesota Lynx, but the moment itself is something she’ll never forget.

“I’m just grateful that my name was called,” Ogwumike said, in awe. “I was like, okay, this is really gonna happen. And yeah, even now, it still feels kind of strange.”

Ogwumike knows she’ll field just as many questions about herself as she will about her family name. Her sisters were mentioned numerous times during her introductory zoom call (a sign of the times, right?) with the Lynx.

Erica credited favorable genetics and the challenge of playing against Nneka and Chiney growing up for part of her ability to reach this point in her basketball career. She admitted rebounding might be attributable as much be to her bloodline as her efforts.

The Roost Podcast: Check out our Extended Offseason Interview Series

Another thank you was extended to Tina Langley, Ogwumike’s coach at Rice over her last three seasons. Ogwumike said Langley was in contact with her before and after the draft, reaching out to her former player to share her congratulations. “She’s really happy that I was able to accomplish this and I credit a lot of it to her as well,” Ogwumike said. “She’s been a great coach, a great mentor and I’m happy to have her in my life.”

Life will look a bit different in Minnesota than it did at South Main. Whenever Ogwumike is able to arrive she’ll trade labs for full-time hoops, eager to give pro basketball her all for the time being. As with everything else, she’s ready for the challenge.

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Rice Basketball Recruiting: Owls add transfer Riley Abercrombie from Boise St

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Former Boise State forward Riley Abercrombie will transfer to Rice basketball. He’s expected to be eligible to play this coming season.

Rice basketball had to retool after graduation and transfers thinned out its roster. Head coach Scott Pera hit the transfer portal, looking for the right players to fortify the depleted roster. Five new Owls have been added in the past few weeks. One of those new additions is returning back to Houston after two brief years away from home.

Boise State transfer Riley Abercrombie will transfer to Rice. Although no official announcement has been made at this time, he’s expected to be eligible for the 2020-2021 season. Abercrombie is an Australian native who played his high school basketball at Clear Lake in Houston. The 6-foot-9 forward spent the last two years at Boise.

Abercrombie redshirted his first season before seeing his first collegiate action last season. He played in 18 games,  last season, seeing extended action twice. He scored six points in 12 minutes against Alabama State and four points in 17 minutes against Utah State. For his career, Abercrombie tallied 23 points, 12 rebounds and three assists.

The Roost Podcast: Listen now to our Extended Offseason Interview Series

Even though several of his peers were not afforded the same opportunity, Abercrombie had the chance to visit campus and had previously met the coaches in person. That played a crucial role in his decision making process, one which he’s confident has led him to the right place.

Abercrombie cited a combination of driving forces in his decision to come to South Main including the Owls’ “great style of play” as well as “opportunity at [his] position.” The staff and the proximity to home were important as well. The academics rounded out the full picture. When it came time to make his decision, he called it “a no brainer in the end.”

He’ll add some size on the outside as well as another shooting presence from the wing. Abercrombie prides himself on his deep ball and expects to drop some threes when he gets on the court in Houston.

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WNBA Draft: Erica Ogwumike chosen by Liberty, traded to Lynx

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Former Rice women’s basketball star Erica Ogwumike has been selected by the New York Liberty in the 2020 WNBA Draft and traded to the Minnesota Lynx.

When her Rice women’s basketball career came to a close, Erica Ogwumike had already paved the way for her future off the court. The Owls’ all-time leader in scoring average had spent most of the preseason flying back and forth across the country as she interviewed with medical schools. Ogwumike has since been accepted to nine medical schools, but her immediate future was somewhat in flux.

That was true until Friday night, when Ogwumike was selected by the New York with the second pick of the third round of the WNBA Draft. She was soon traded to the Minnesota Lynx.

Erica joins her sisters, Nneka and Chiney in the professional ranks. She is the third of four sisters to earn a WNBA Draft selection. Both Nneka and Chiney were chosen first overall, Nneka by the Los Angeles Sparks in 2012 and Chiney by the Connecticut Sun in 2014. Ogwumike had to wait her turn to come off the board, but still joined an exclusive group of WNBA draftees.

More on The Roost Podcast: Erica Ogwumike talks COVID-19 and her Rice career

As evidenced by her medical school opportunities, the youngest sister took a different path to begin her professional career. Erica was not a highly-touted recruited. Nor did she make any NCAA Tournament Final Four appearances like her sisters. She took a less conventional route, going from Pepperdine to Rice, where she caught fire as her career progressed.

Ogwumike finished her collegiate career as the back-to-back Conference USA Player of the Year. She led her team to back-to-back regular season conference championships and an NCAA Tournament appearance in 2019. A truncated 2020 season prevented what could have been another postseason run.

Those memories will take a back seat for now as Ogwumike embarks on a new adventure. For now, med school is on hold. Ogwumike is headed to the WNBA.

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Rice Basketball 2020: Transfers plunge promising offseason into uncertainty

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Rice basketball finds itself in a challenging position after losing three players to the Transfer Portal in the span of one week.

The sports news cycle hasn’t slowed down. Even though it’s been more than two weeks since sports of any kind were played, the news has continued to rise to the surface. Not all of it has been positive for Rice basketball.

On Friday, senior Josh Parrish announced he was transferring from the program. Sophomore Trey Murphy followed on Saturday. The dam broke Tuesday when fellow sophomore Drew Peterson also put his name into the Transfer Portal. In the span of less than a week, a promising offseason turned into a painfully bleak new reality.

Rice was already set to lose Ako Adams and Robert Martin to graduation this offseason. Now they’ll have to replace their top-five leading scorers. Absent those five, guard Chris Mullins is the only remaining player on the roster who started more than seven games last season. He averaged 7.3 points.

Murphy said “it was just time for a different opportunity”. Multiple sources have confirmed his suitor list will be vast. The talented shooter has been contacted by Arkansas, Arizona, Arizona State, Cincinnati, DePaul, Iowa State, Stanford, Texas, Wichita State, and Xavier. The allure of playing at the Power 5 level is clear.

More: Erica Ogwumike talks end of season, Rice career on The Roost Podcast

Peterson’s decision was not made in a vacuum. He called his choice to enter the transfer portal “in part, reactionary to [Murphy’s decision]. He added that he loved coach Pera, but it was “time for a new chapter” and that it was a “really hard decision.” Interest in services is heating up quickly. In the days since his announcement, he’s been contacted by Virginia Tech, Stanford, Minnesota, Cincinnati and Creighton, among others.

Roughly two weeks ago I spoke with Owls’ head coach Scott Pera. We had a great conversation, leading to a series of articles on the team and the future he’s trying to build at South Main. “It’s a process, it’s a growth, it’s a vision that now is really, really exciting. We enter Year 4 with this group coming back,” Pera said then. A lot has changed since and that core could be back to square one by the fall.

Pera issued this statement following the transfers:

I’m sorry to see the guys leave. I wish them the best. I’m going to continue to try to find the right guys for Rice, this program and this University as long as I am the head coach.

These losses will hamstring a program that had improved in the win column in every season under Pera. There’s hope for the future, anchored in two successive promising recruiting classes, but the near term just got unequivocally harder.

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