Louisville transfer forward Kamari Lands pledges to ASU
One byproduct of the transfer portal is that a school that may have been extremely close to securing the services of a recruit coming out of high school can have a formidable chance of having them join the ranks later on. Such is the case with 6-8 Louisville transfer forward Kamari Lands, who was seriously considering ASU before he committed to the Cardinals and announced on Tuesday morning that he was pledging to the Sun Devils.
Lands played locally in the valley at Phoenix Hillcrest Prep and averaged 33.4 points, 10.5 rebounds, 2.8 assists, and 2.5 steals per game and shot 55 percent from the field as a senior. The forward was a four-star and Top-100 2022 prospect, and the race for his services was closely contested between Arizona State, a school he naturally gained a lot of exposure to during his prep career, and Louisville, which is geographically closer to his hometown of Indianapolis.
“I definitely had a good connection with the Arizona State coaches and was comfortable with them,” Lands said. “So it was an easy decision. I’m only supposed to visit them next week, but I expected to commit to them before I visited them because I was already comfortable with them because I already visited them a few times when I played in high school there. I like that coach Hurley is a hands-on coach; I like the environment there, and I’ve always wanted to play on the West Coast and in the Pac-12. So this is a good fit for me.”
In his freshman year and lone season playing for Louisville, The forward averaged 5.9 points, shooting 32.6 percent from the field and 32.1 percent from three-point range and averaging 1.9 rebounds. Lands saw action in 32 games for Louisville, starting in six of them. The Cardinal posted an overall 4-28 record and a 2-18 ACC mark.
“The Arizona State coaches want to develop this guard side of my game,” Lands described. “They just want to help me showcase what I can do on the floor, which is my shooting, passing, and scoring. I just want to win, honestly. I saw what Arizona State did going to the (NCAA) tournament, and that definitely made an impression because I wanted to go to a place that has that winning timeline. That’s where I want to get to.”
Following the worst season in program history, there was a natural exodus of players from Louisville, and Lands was part of that group of individuals who, like many of them, was recruited by former head coach Chris Mack who current head coach Kenny Payne replaced.
CardinalSports.com Publisher Ty Spalding said that as a newcomer, Lands generated formidable preseason buzz at Louisville but, much like his teammates, was stuck in a nightmare of the season, which collectively affected the Cardinal.
“Kamari stuck through his commitment when the new coaching staff took over,” Spalding recalled. “As Kenny Payne started doing press conferences leading up to the season, he alluded to the fact of, ‘if we’re going to be good, we’re going to need Kamari to play at a high level, and we’re going to depend on him quite a bit.’ So everyone was really excited about him. He’s got a great frame and a great looking shot. As the season progressed, there’d be games where you felt that this dude was going be a building block for Payne’s tenure. And then there’ll be other games where he looked like a freshman who was unsure of himself.
“But I think generally speaking from a fan perspective, I think most fans probably saw the potential in Kamari and saw that the good games outweighed the bad ones, and they wanted him to be a part of the future. But with what’s going on here, basically, this staff winning just four games essentially just said, ‘It was the players’ fault.’ So they were going to flip the roster, have tough conversations with the players, and only bring back two or three guys off this current roster. I don’t think it was a situation where the coaches showed Kamari the door. They had some conversations, and it was just a mutual decision where both sides thought they would be better off with a different start somewhere else.”
Spalding said that the forward’s skill level, especially as a newcomer to college basketball, was plenty impressive.
“I think he was a good piece here,” Spalding remarked. “He can really shoot the ball, and that’s what he did in high school really well. He was a really good three-point shooter, and his form is really solid and looks like the form of a big time player. His frame is great, and his body is college ready. He could play a couple of different positions and played most of the time the 2 and 3 positions, and if you go small, he can play the 4. He’s a good pickup for Arizona State.
“There was nothing that ended on bad terms. Nobody thought that this guy should leave because he couldn’t play here. When it came out that he was entering the portal, there were some people that were like, ‘Oh my gosh, what’s happening?’ But they also knew this was the start of a roster turnover. A lot of people really thought he could be something special here.”
“I definitely learned a lot from that season,” Lands noted. “I got a lot of game experience, and that’s good especially being a freshman coming in and getting to play a lot and went through a lot. I’m gonna take all that stuff into next season, learn from it, and grow from it.”
Lands, who chose ASU over Santa Clara and Vanderbilt, has three years of eligibility left and is expected to arrive in Tempe in late May.
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