Vanderbilt Basketball Loses Fourth Player to the Transfer Portal – Sports Illustrated

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It is officially the third day that the college basketball transfer portal has been opened up and Vanderbilt has now lost its fourth player since the portal opened.
Per a report from Jamie Shaw of On3 Sports, Vanderbilt guard and rotational player Mike James has entered the transfer portal after spending one season with the Commodores.
James transferred to Vanderbilt from NC State after a knee injury kept him from ever suiting up for the Wolfpack during the 2024-2025 season. James spent the first two seasons of his collegiate career as a redshirt at Louisville for the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 seasons.
In his lone season at Vanderbilt, James appeared in 22 of Vanderbilt’s 36 games. James averaged 1.5 points off the bench and was unable to find a consistent spot in head coach Mark Byington’s rotation.
James did see his minutes and production increase for about a month’s time span from the back half of January to the first half of February. During that time, James helped fill a role while the Commodores’ dealt with injuries, specifically to one of the team leaders in Duke Miles. But once Miles returned from injury, James played just nine minutes on Feb. 21 against Tennessee and only a few seconds in Vanderbilt’s SEC Tournament win over Tennessee on March 13.
James did not see game action in Vanderbilt’s other two games in the SEC Tournament, nor in the team’s two NCAA Tournament games.
James now joins Jaylon Dean-Vines, George Kimble III and Tyler Harris as the four Commodores to enter the transfer portal this offseason.
The offseason for Byington and his staff continues to get more busy and more interesting with another roster spot that needs to be filled. Vanderbilt now has multiple spots to fill in the backcourt with starters and guys that can give productive minutes off the bench. Additionally, the Commodores have multiple spots to fill in the frontcourt with Jalen Washington and Devin McGlockton now gone.
So far, Vanderbilt has not added anyone through the transfer portal. Though, it has only been open since Monday and will be open until April 21. In the next 13 days, Byington and his staff will need to add around four players from the portal, if not, more.
James is likely going to be the final player from this past season’s roster to enter the portal based on who is now left, so there should not be much more loss from the roster going forward. However, the decision everybody is waiting for is what Tyler Tanner is going to do.
If Tanner returns, that gives a lot of clarity of the trajectory Vanderbilt will be on. If he does not, it will certainly complicate things for next season.
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Graham Baakko is a writer for Vanderbilt Commodores On SI, primarily covering football, basketball and baseball. Graham is a recent graduate from the University of Alabama, where he wrote for The Crimson White, WVUA-FM, WVUA 23 as he covered a variety of Crimson Tide sports. He also covered South Carolina athletics as a sportswriting intern for GamecockCentral.
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