Texas Tech basketball: Red Raiders flip important transfer away from Oregon

In today’s world of basketball, no team can have too many athletic, versatile wing players.  Fortunately, that’s now a position of strength for the Texas Tech basketball program following Saturday’s commitment of Devan Cambridge, a transfer who has played at Auburn and Arizona State and who was committed to Oregon this offseason but who never signed with the Ducks.

The 6-foot-6, 215-pound native of  Nashville, Tennessee was in Lubbock this weekend for an official visit and now he’s decided to follow in the footsteps of his friend and fellow former Sun Devil Warren Washington and jump from Tempe to Lubbock for his final season of college hoops.

Last season, his only go-round with Arizona State, Cambridge had his best statistical campaign thus far.  Averaging 9.8 points, 5.4 boards, and 0.8 assists per game, he established new career highs in almost every meaningful category.

Shooting 50.4% from the floor, Cambridge was effective at getting to the rim and finishing in traffic.  In fact, he shot 58.6% on two-point attempts indicating that much of his work was done at or near the goal.  From 3-point range, he was a respectable 33.3% while averaging 2.3 attempts per game.

With 127 career games at the college level under his belt, this is a player who has seen just about everything the college game has to offer.  He’s scored in double-figures on 40 occasions and even has a pair of 20-point efforts including 26 against South Carolina and 21 against LSU while playing for Auburn in 2020.

Now, one must consider Cambridge a candidate to crack the Red Raiders’ starting lineup, especially given that he’s amassed 68 starts thus far.  But regardless of how he is deployed by new Texas Tech basketball head coach Grant McCasland, he will give his new coach plenty of versatility on the wing.

Already with 6-foot-7 Grand Canyon transfer Chance McMillan and 6-foot-8 Georgia transfer KyeRon Lindsay in the mix and expected to compete for starting jobs, McCasland now has a wealth of talent to put around presumed starting point guard Pop Isaacs and Washington, the presumed starting center.

In fact, one could easily envision McMillan, Lindsay, and Cambridge rounding out the starting lineup together.  Or, a player such as Nevada transfer Derrion Williams might get the opportunity to start next to Isaacs in the backcourt with Williams coming off of a freshman-of-the-year campaign in the Mountain West Conference last season.

Whatever McCasland decides to do, it is now clear that he’s going to have a team that is far more versatile and athletic than the squad his predecessor, Mark Adams, rolled out in the most recent Red Raider season. That team was small at the guard positions with Isaacs and De’Vion Harmon both starting despite each being under 6-foot-2.

In fact, Tech’s only true size on the wings was Jaylon Tyson (who was rather allergic to playing defense at times), and true freshman Elijah Fisher who saw only sporadic playing time in between the meals of salmon and steak that he didn’t quite enjoy as much as many of us would when we were in college.

That was a far cry from Texas Tech teams of the recent past, teams that have typically been built around rangy, fast, long, and active wings such as Jarrett Culver, Zhaire Smith, Adonis Arms, Terrence Shannon, Kevin McCullar, and others.

Now, it appears that McCasland is set to bring that staple of the last decade back to Lubbock where defense and athleticism have been the hallmarks of the program.  In those regards, Cambridge might be a perfect fit given his athletic profile and physical traits.  Now, we look forward to seeing how all of the new puzzle pieces fit together when the season starts this fall.