Tennessee basketball is working the transfer portal after losing its Elite 8 matchup to Houston. The 69-50 loss ended Tennessee's season and hopes to advance to the Final Four.
Now that the Vols are officially in the offseason, the program has transitioned into full-time transfer portal recruiting mode. Tennessee has already hosted a couple of players on campus and will look to sign a few more throughout the Spring portal recruiting cycle.
One player Tennessee has targeted is Illinois transfer freshman forward Morez Johnson Jr. CBS Sports insider John Rothstein reports Tennessee is one of the six finalists on Johnson's list.
The Vols join SEC rivals Arkansas and Kentucky, Big Ten powers Ohio State and Michigan, and perennial blue-blood Kansas.
Johnson averaged 7.0 points, 6.7 rebounds, and 0.3 assists while shooting 64.2% from the field in his freshman season. His freshman season success landed him as the No. 23 transfer in this year's portal class, according to ESPN's top-100 transfer player rankings.
"Johnson showed flashes of his tremendous potential despite coming off the bench for most of the season, averaging 7.0 points, 6.7 rebounds and 1.1 blocks in 17.7 minutes," ESPN shared. "In eight games as a starter, he put up 9.9 points and 6.3 boards and shot 69% from the field."
He primarily played in relief for the Fighting Illini and was a powerful presence off the bench. He finished the season with a slight disadvantage against his competition. He played the final month with a broken wrist after making an impressive block against Michigan State in February.
The Vols have yet to sign a player out of the transfer portal, although they are working on building its roster for the 2025-26 season.