How Jase Richardson’s departure affects MSU’s transfer portal strategy.

On Tuesday, another domino fell in Michigan State basketball’s offseason, with Jase Richardson making the decision to leave MSU and declare for the 2025 NBA Draft. The impact from the star freshman’s departure is sort of a big one, and will now dictate what the Spartans will do for the rest of the offseason, to bring the roster together.

Michigan State is now left with just eight players on the roster for the 2025-26 season, needing to make some serious roster acquisitions in order to bring the roster back to a championship contending standard.

Whether Tom Izzo likes it or not, with losing Richardson and Tre Holloman in particular, along with Xavier Booker and Gehrig Normand, the Spartans are going to have to use the transfer portal in the next few weeks.

At the start of the offseason, four positions were identified as potential needs for the Spartans, and as it stands today, three of these are must gets:

Kur Teng is the only shooting guard left on the roster, and with the sophomore only having played 3.1 minutes per game in 2024-25, it is irresponsible to ask him to jump 20+ minutes per game in 2025-26.

While Teng will play into the equation in 2025-26, a starting shooting guard is a non-negotiable for Michigan State in the portal.

Coen Carr is going to be the starter at small forward for Michigan State, behind him, it is only true freshman Jordan Scott and moving Kur Teng up from shooting guard. Needless to say, the depth is thin at small forward.

Michigan State does not necessarily need to add a starter, which is nice, but a sixth man at the wing is going to be an add the Spartans have to consider making.

The trickiest add, and need, for the Spartans this offseason is going to be centered around finding Jeremy Fears a backup. Fears is currently the only point guard and ball handler on the roster. Teng, a shooting guard, is far from being able to run the offense. So all of this correlates to desperately needing an insurance policy to Fears.

Whether it is foul trouble, limiting minutes or even an injury, the Spartans have to get someone that can run the point behind Fears.