Texas Basketball: 3 transfers shining through the first 10 games

Tre Mitchell, C

I can’t stress enough how much potential the Longhorns have in place in their frontcourt unit pairing in the starting five between Allen and the former UMass Minutemen star junior center Tre Mitchell. Texas is definitely finding something so far this season in this frontcourt pairing. It just has to shine through against ranked competition moving forward.

But you can see that there is potential in what the Longhorns are getting out of Mitchell against top competition. He didn’t have his best outing in the loss to Gonzaga last month. But he responded well and gave the Longhorns a shot to win with his play against Seton Hall.

That is an encouraging sign moving forward when Texas gets into Big 12 play.

While Mitchell isn’t necessarily getting the volume production he did in the last two seasons at UMass, he is more efficient than ever before. He has registered a career-best 12.1 box plus/minus, .308 win shares per 40 minutes, and 29.3 player efficiency rating.

Mitchell’s box plus/minus ranks in the top three in the Big 12 and in the top 25 in Division 1. He’s also in the top 15 in Division 1 in win shares per 40 minutes. To top it all off, Mitchell does lead the Big 12 in win shares per 40 minutes and player efficiency rating.

More specifically, it is just beautiful to watch some of the facilitating ability from Mitchell from the paint. Being able to facilitate the offense from inside-out is an absolute game-changer for Texas and something you’d like to see the team take advantage of more so against better opponents in terms of how it relates to success in the win column.

This is all not to mention how well Mitchell has spaced the floor, rebounded, and protected the rim. He’s truly making about the most well-rounded impact that the Longhorns could ask for through 10 games this season.