Tennessee basketball: Could Vols be a landing spot for Isaiah Stokes?

Isaiah Stokes put his name in the transfer portal on Wednesday afternoon. He could be a good fit for Rick Barnes and the Tennessee basketball team.

It hasn’t been the best past couple of weeks for Rick Barnes and Tennessee basketball. They missed out on the highly coveted graduate transfer, Kerry Blackshear, which turns out according to sources was 100 percent Barnes’ fault.

Then just a couple of days later, redshirt freshman, D.J. Burns decided to add his name to the transfer portal. To be fair, no one knows the impact Burns would have had on the team in the 2019-20 season, but losing a big body never helps.

However, Tennessee could be in on a big that just hit the transfer market.

On Wednesday afternoon, word hit Twitter that Florida’s redshirt freshman big, Isaiah Stokes is transferring from the program. Could this be because Florida was in on the Blackshear sweepstakes? And, the fact that the Gators are starting to recruit at a high level.

So, why Tennessee?

The Vols are in the market for a big. Derrick Walker and D.J. Burns both left the program. Outside of John Fulkerson and Zach Kent, Tennessee doesn’t have a big. Of course, there is Uros Plavsic but there are still a lot of unknowns with him.

We can’t forget the tie the Stokes family has to Tennesee. Isaiah is the younger brother of former Vol, Jarnell Stokes.

Jarnell played for the Vols from 2011-14 averaging 13 points per game. His best season came in 2013-14 where he scored 15.1 points per game while pulling down 10.6 rebounds per game. That season, Stokes shot 53.1 percent from the floor.

I have no clue if the younger Stokes would want to follow in his brother’s footsteps, but Tennessee could be an option. And, if the 2020 recruiting class is as good as it’s trending, the Vols could have one of the best rosters for the next few years.