Jerrod Calhoun Updates Cincinnati's Roster Build Being 'Couple Pieces Away' From Complete

The Cincinnati Bearcats basketball team has largely filled out its main rotation for the upcoming 2026-27 season. It's an all-transfer team for Jerrod Calhoun in his first year at the helm. He took some time from the busy stretch to hop on Coffee With Cunningham Wednesday to update the roster build so far.

Cincinnati is up to nine players with six spots left. They may add 1-2 more solid rotation players and then Calhoun noted a development focus for the rest of the spots.

"We've hit on almost every kid that's come on our campus," Calhoun said about their efficient visit lineup so far. "I think whatever we've signed, we've only not gotten one commitment (from players who visited). So I think the first and foremost is we're not wasting our time bringing in kids and chasing kids we can't get right. That's one thing that Coach (Rollie) Massimino taught me years ago in recruiting: some guys spend more time chasing guys they can't get.

"So we want to identify guys that want to be part of the University of Cincinnati's campus community and it's been really good. I'll be honest, I'm really excited where we're at. We just have to finish the last couple spots, we're going to get some developmental guys probably at the end of this, but we're just a couple pieces away."

Portal Poppin

Cincinnati head coach Jerrod Calhoun speaks during a press conference announcing him as the head men's basketball coach at Fifth Third Arena in Cincinnati on Wednesday, March 25, 2026. | Albert Cesare/The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Calhoun also hinted at "a couple of announcements" that will happen in the next two days. One of those was new lead guard Tylen Riley, committing to Cincinnati after an All-AAC season at Tulsa.

"There's some announcements that will happen here in the next two days," Calhoun stated. "However, I think we have positional size. I think everybody in the Big 12 is looking for positional size. Seeing Arizona up front they have positional size, so we kind of took that model and then we want to add some depth. And those are things that are going to be important. Challenges (in this transfer recruiting process) I would say John just not being in the NCAA Tournament, but we're going to get back here real, real soon, and I think that'll be the last time we have to deal with that. So just continue to sell our vision. And so far, it's been really, really good."

Depending on where you look, Cincinnati has an entrenched top-30 transfer portal class in the country so far, and they are hoping they just hired a top-25 coach in the country to pair it with.

If both ring true across the 31 (or newly-added 32nd game option) contests over the next year, then Cincinnati will be dancing into the NCAA Tournament for the first time this decade.

Check out the full update from Calhoun in the YouTube chat below at the 16-minute mark:

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