Three Stanford MBB Players to Keep an Eye Amid Offseason Departures

Entering his second season as the head coach of the Stanford Cardinal men's basketball program, Kyle Smith's "Nerd Ball" philosophy showed that it can work with the new roster following a 21-14 campaign. The trick heading into the 2025-26 season will be coming up with a new plan of attack with some new faces on the roster.

With Maxime Raynaud getting drafted by the Sacramento Kings, Jaylen Blakes graduating, and Oziyah Sellers transferring to St. John's, the Cardinal will be without three key cogs of their roster from last season. They're also bringing in five new players-- three freshman and two graduate level--that will need to be incorporated into the mix as well.

Last year, Raynaud was the focal point of the offense, with the 7-foot-1 Frenchman putting up 20.2 points and 10.6 rebounds per game. He also averaged roughly 16 shots per game, and due to his inside game, made a large percentage of them.

Sellers was also a high percentage shot-maker, averaging roughly 11 shots a game. Blakes, who consistently drove to the basket and drained his shots at a high clip, took about nine per game. So if everything stays fairly consistent possessions-wise, the Cardinal will be looking to fill roughly 36 shots a game, and they'll be looking to give those to the players that have the highest likelihood of making them.

Based off of playing time from last season, Ryan Agarwal, Benny Gealer, Aidan Cammann and Chisom Okpara would appear to be likely candidates to start, given that they played regularly over the course of the season last year. Donavin Young also received good minutes when he was available.

Of those, Young may be a player to watch out for. As a freshman, he played in 19 games, starting 16 of those, and averaged 3.2 points in 17.3 minutes a game. He stands 6-foot-8, so he's a little shorter than Raynaud, but he was able to stroke it from deep at an extremely high clip in limited opportunities. Last season he hoisted up 22 total three balls, making 12 of them, good for a 54.5% clip.

Obviously this is a small sample, and we don't have the data on what the game situations were when he'd hit those triples, but that rate sure stands out. If he could knock them down somewhere between 35-40% of the time while taking more of them, then he could become Stanford's stretch five as early as this coming season.

Stanford will also be looking for a step forward from Agarwal, who hoisted up 6.2 threes per game, but only shot 28.8% from deep. If he could up that percentage a tad, then he may be able to fill more of Blakes' production from last season (30.1%). Like Blakes, he shot well inside the arc, so just a little bump in production could get him there.

The last piece of the puzzle will be the most interesting to watch, since it's grad transfer Jeremy Dent-Smith, who is making the leap from Division II to D1. At Cal-State Dominguez Hills last season, the guard was a high volume shooter, averaging 14.5 shots per game, and making them at a 42.9 percent clip overall.

From three, he hit 35.4% of his shots, which isn't quite as high as Sellers' total from last year, but he certainly has a chance to be a big-time scorer for the Cardinal. That will be based on if he's given the opportunity, which is fairly likely, and how quickly he makes the adjustment to playing in the ACC, which is yet to be determined.

These three guys could be the ones to keep an eye out for to receive more of an opportunity in the early going of the men's basketball season. There will be more shots to go around this season, and coach Smith is certainly going to make sure he has the right guys launching them.