Ole Miss Men’s Hoops Etch Arizona State Grad Transfer

By Adam Brown
Sports Editor
adam.brown@hottytoddy.com

Ole Miss men’s basketball coach Kermit Davis added graduate transfer Romello White to the 2020-21 squad last Friday.

White comes to the Rebels as a 6-foot-8 forward from Arizona State and the No. 2 graduate transfer, according to ESPN. Last season with the Sun Devils he averaged 10.2 points per game and pulled in 8.8 rebounds per night.

“We are extremely excited to welcome Romello to the Ole Miss family,” Davis said. “Romello is a very accomplished player that impacted winning at a high level at Arizona State. He finished second in the Pac-12 in rebounding last year and became one of the all-time shooters in conference history in terms of field goal percentage. Romello is extremely tough, fits very well in our system of play, and we can’t wait to get started this summer. He has such a high ceiling in front of him that can impact the SEC in a great way.”

Over three seasons at Arizona State, White started 92 of the 95 games he played for the Sun Devils. He tallied 927 points during his ASU career, averaging 9.8 ppg and shooting 60.5 percent from the floor (second on the program’s all-time list). He also led the team in offensive rebounds to go along with 16 career double-doubles.

During the 2019-20 campaign, White ranked second in the Pac-12 with 8.8 rebounds per game. The Atlanta, Georgia, native averaged 10.2 ppg and produced eight double-doubles throughout the season. On the offensive end of the court, he made 112 of his 197 attempts for the ninth-best field goal percentage in school history (56.9 percent). Defensively, he produced a team-high 35 blocks. In a 79-59 win over Georgia (Dec. 14, 2019), White put together a double-double with 18 points and a career-high 17 rebounds.

White helped the Sun Devils reach the NCAA Tournament as a redshirt-sophomore, playing in all 34 games and starting 32 of them. While reaching double digits in scoring 14 times during the season, he averaged 8.7 ppg to go along with 5.2 rpg. White recorded a team-high 19 points in wins over Colorado (Jan. 5, 2019) and UCLA (March 14, 2019), the latter an 8 for 10 shooting display in the quarterfinals of the Pac-12 Tournament.

Coming out of Wheeler High School outside of Atlanta, White was the No. 77th player ranked in the country, according to ESPN’s recruiting rankings.

White is the second grad transfer to join Davis’ Ole Miss squad along with Dimencio Vaughn out of Rider. The duo will be joining some talented newcomers to the program including Jarkel Joiner, Shon Robinson, Matthew Murrell and Robert Allen for the upcoming season.

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