Northern Colorado small forward Saint Thomas enters NCAA Transfer Portal
Another high-caliber college basketball player intends to find a new home for next season. On3 has learned, Northern Colorado small forward Saint Thomas entered the NCAA Transfer Portal.
Thomas just wrapped up his junior year with the Northern Colorado Bears after spending the first two years of his collegiate career at Loyola in Illinois. The six-foot-seven Omaha, NE, native put together an impressive season in the Big Sky Conference. Thomas started and played in all 32 games for Northern Colorado, averaging nearly 35 minutes (34.8) of action per contest.
He would finish the season averaging nearly a double-double with 19.7 points and 9.8 rebounds per contest. But that wasn’t the only impressive part of his stat line, as Thomas proved himself to be a stat sheet stuffer at Northern Colorado. He would also average 4.2 assists, 1.7 steals, and 0.9 blocks per contest while also shooting 47 percent from the field and 33 percent from beyond the arc.
Thanks to Thomas, who led the Bears with points and rebounds per contest and was second on the team in assists, Northern Colorado finished this year with a 19-14 record and a 12-6 record in conference play, which was good enough for second place in the Big Sky men’s basketball conference.
Thomas enters the NCAA Transfer Portal as one of the top-rated players according to On3’s player rankings. Coming in with a rating of 91 puts him just outside of the top 10, tied at No. 13, largely because of the offensive versatility he displayed last season.
At Northern Colorado last season, he made 159 of the 278 of his two-point basket attempts, shooting just over 57 percent inside the arc. But it’s also proved that he is effective when allowed to collect points at the cherry stripe. With the Bears, he shot 86.8 percent from the free throw line, and that was not even a career-best.
His best statistical season from the charity stripe was his freshman year at Loyola Chicago, where he made 87.5 percent of his free throws. Thomas has never finished a season in college, shooting less than 81 percent from the line.
There is likely one metric that shines above them all, and programs looking to acquire services will be salivating. When it comes to his true shooting percentage, Thomas is right near the top. In fact, he is above the average of NBA players and well above that of men’s college basketball, with a 59 percent mark this season.