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Reports: Cal's Jalen Celestine Enters Transfer Portal
Rivals and 247 Sports report that Celestine enters the portal, which means Cal may not have any returning starters for its first season in the ACC
Rivals and 247 Sports reported on Monday that Jalen Celestine, who was a starter for the Cal basketball team this season, has entered the transfer portal.
This report has not been confirmed by Celestine, but Rivals and 247 Sports are typically reliable sources.
Three of Cal's 2023-24 starters -- Keonte Kennedy, Fardaws Aimaq and Jalen Cone -- have run out of eligibility, and a fourth starter, Jaylon Tyson, is considering giving up his final year of college eligibility to enter the 2024 NBA draft.
With Celestine also in the transfer portal, Cal and coach Mark Madsen could be heading into Atlantic Coast Conference play next season without any of the five starters from this past season's squad, which went 13-19 overall and 9-11 in the Pac-12.
Celestine, a guard/forward, averaged 8.7 points and 3.2 rebounds this past season and had the lowest scoring average of Cal's five starters. However, he was the team's top three-point shooter, hitting 44.0% of his shots from beyond the arc, which ranked second in the conference.
Celestine was the Bears' only starter who was retained from Mark Fox's squad from the 2022-23 season. (Devin Askew also returned from the 2022-23 team, but he missed all but six games in 2023-24 with an injury.)
Celestine would be the sixth Cal player to enter the transfer portal since the end of the season. He would join Askew, Grant Newell, Rodney Brown Jr., Monty Bowser and ND Okafor in the portal.
It was assumed Madsen would try to restock his roster with transfers, although now it appears he will be starting from scratch in that regard. Madsen did sign one high school player scheduled to arrive next fall -- point guard Jeremiah Wilkinson.
It has become commonplace for elite teams to use the transfer portal to improve their roster. North Carolina State's top seven scorers all began their college careers at another school, and five of the seven transferred to North Carolina State before the 2023-24 season. The Wolfpack is now in the Final Four.
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