The Wisconsin Badgers have now had two of their players jump into the transfer portal, as today, Daniel Freitag entered it. He joins fellow backup guard Camren Hunter in seeking a new home. While neither is overly surprising, as both were only brought in with barely any minutes last season, Freitag is slightly more surprising.
Daniel Freitag is now in the Transfer Portal, another loss in depth for Greg Gard
Freitag came in as a 4-star recruit in the 2024 recruiting class and seemed to understand his role of waiting a year in reserve. There was no room on the depth chart last year for him, and he posted on social media a lot about how he loved playing for his guys and battling with them. Seemingly understanding that his role was coming next year (this coming season).
However, he has decided now to find a spot with more minutes and maybe a guaranteed role. It’s hard to know if Wisconsin head coach Greg Gard was going to guarantee him a starting spot or not. There have been plenty of reports of Wisconsin bringing in veteran guards in for visits out of the transfer portal. It could be that Freitag saw the writing on the wall and sensed he’d be only a bench piece at best next season.
Freitag only played in 14 games last season, and it was mostly in mop-up duties. If he sensed he was going to only get a slight bump in both minutes and games and not get a starting role, it’s hard to blame him for moving on and looking for a new home.
It’s hard to see a player that Gard and company were developing for the future walk away. While that is the nature of the NIL era and transfer portal, where players move around year to year, it’s still not easy to watch.
