South Carolina basketball just won their third national championship and became just the fifth program ever to go undefeated. The team only lost one player from the rotation as center Kamilla Cardoso was taken with the third overall pick of the WNBA Draft by the Chicago Sky.
Many around the sport of women's college basketball have argued that the Gamecocks have a chance to be even better next season. However, with a potential transfer portal addition that has become a possibility, the chances of the 2024-2025 USC team being even better than the 2023-2024 squad go through the roof.
According to social media women's college basketball insider Skim Milkey (if you know, you know), Stanford transfer portal forward Kiki Iriafen is set to visit Columbia next week.
Iriafen is a consensus top-3 player in the transfer portal after the rising senior entered the portal when long-time Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer retired this offseason. Iriafen burst onto the scene as a junior, fulfilling the vast potential she always has shown.
The leading scorer on a team with fellow All-American Cameron Brink, Iriafen scored just under 20 points per game and secured over 11 rebounds per contest, as well. She also is a long and rangy defender who can competently guard any player in college basketball.
Rumors about Iriafen's interest in the South Carolina basketball program began almost two weeks ago when word started to come out that she planned to enter the transfer portal after VanDerveer's retirement.
After the Skim Milkey post, Gamecock head coach Dawn Staley played into the rumors with a social media message of her own.
👹👹👹 pic.twitter.com/5nHyDMCXR0
— dawnstaley (@dawnstaley) April 25, 2024
Obviously, nothing is finalized with Kiki Iriafen until she makes a commitment to a school. However, if Dawn Staley can pull this off, the Gamecocks will have a really good chance of repeating as champions.
You can watch some of her film here.