Texas Basketball: Predicting the Horns first portal pickup of the offseason
Ze’Rik Onyema, PF
Among the newest portal targets for Terry and the Longhorns staff this week is the former UTEP Miners junior power forward Ze’Rik Onyema. The 6-foot-8 and 225-pound San Antonio, TX, native has already made contact with Texas since his name surfaced in the transfer portal on April 18.
Texas has reportedly (per On3) made contact with UTEP transfer PF Ze'Rik Onyema this week. The junior big man will take a visit to the 40 in the coming weeks.
— Hook'em Headlines (@HookemHeadlines) April 22, 2023
-7.7 PPG, 4.4 RPG, 1 SPG, 1 BPG
-1.012 points per possession on post-ups, 1.286 PPP in transition (both top 5 in C-USA) pic.twitter.com/Is4wHreYqn
Texas now looks to be one of the schools that will be getting a visit from Onyema in the coming days and weeks.
UTEP transfer Ze’Rik Onyema tells TPR that he will visit the following schools:
— The Portal Report (@ThePortalReport) April 21, 2023
Vanderbilt (24th-27th)
Texas Tech
Ole Miss
Texas
6’8 forward averaged 7.1 PPG and 4.4 RPG this season. pic.twitter.com/WhY9jmjxZc
According to a tweet from The Portal Report on April 21, Onyema’s visit schedule will begin on April 24, with a multi-day trip to Nashville to see the Vanderbilt Commdores. Texas along with the Ole Miss Rebels and Texas Tech Red Raiders are the other schools that are currently on the docket to get visits from the UTEP transfer.
We don’t have an exact visit date as of yet on April 22 for Onyema’s trip to the Forty Acres. But I would imagine that it would probably come at some point next week or next weekend given the dates for his trip to Vanderbilt.
Moreover, this is building up to be a really interesting portal recruitment for the Longhorns. This will probably be the first portal battle between the former Texas head coach (now at Ole Miss) Chris Beard and the newly-hired Terry.
It sounds like the role that Terry and the Longhorns are looking to fill with the defensive standout Onyema is a third big man to start filling out of the frontcourt unit on the bench. If Texas could land both Shedrick and Onyema out of the portal this spring, that would make for the ideal frontcourt situation for the Longhorns ahead of the 2023-24 season.