A second Wichita State player is planning to enter the NCAA transfer portal
Brian Amuneke arrived at Wichita State as the kind of transfer who made sense on paper.
He was a 6-foot-5 shooting guard, with proven perimeter shooting, from Fresno State, the sort of player who looked like he could give the Shockers a much-needed threat on the perimeter. But after one uneven season in Wichita, that fit never fully materialized.
Now Amuneke will look elsewhere for a fresh start.
The junior-to-be is preparing to enter the transfer portal Tuesday, a source in the program confirmed on the first day the portal officially opened. Amuneke becomes just the second Wichita State player to leave through the portal this offseason, joining senior-to-be point guard Dre Kindell, whose departure was announced last week.
Amuneke’s first season at Wichita State never quite found a rhythm.
The Los Angeles native averaged 2.4 points per game and shot 33% from the field overall, including 19 of 57 from 3-point range. That was a noticeable dip from the 40.7% he shot from deep during his previous stop at Fresno State, where he had shown enough shot-making ability to become an intriguing portal addition for Paul Mills and his staff.
The context around that drop matters.
At Fresno State, Amuneke played on a 6-26 team where, naturally, there was more room to play through mistakes and more freedom for offensive experimentation. At WSU, he entered a more demanding environment, one that asked for consistency, detail and reliable two-way play within a tighter rotation on a team that was chasing wins and, eventually, a postseason berth.
That adjustment proved more difficult than expected.
There were flashes early in the season. Amuneke scored 11 points three different times during nonconference play and showed the clean shooting stroke and confidence that made him an attractive option in the portal in the first place. But once the Shockers moved into American play, his role shrank and so did his production. Over the final 23 games of the season, Amuneke averaged just 1.7 points.
Even within that downturn, there were numbers that suggest his shooting talent never entirely disappeared.
Amuneke still made 37% of his 3s in conference play, but the volume was low — only 27 attempts across 18 games — underscoring how limited his opportunities became once his minutes became more sporadic. His catch-and-shoot profile also remained respectable. He made 36% of his catch-and-shoot 3s this season, down from the 42.5% mark he posted on those looks at Fresno State, but still enough to suggest there is a useful shooter in there for a program willing to give him a larger runway.
Where Amuneke struggled most was inside the arc. He finished just 8 of 27 shots in the paint, a number that reflected the broader issue of his season: When the 3-point volume never came consistently, he was not able to make up for it elsewhere often enough to carve out a bigger place in the rotation.
In that sense, the season felt less like a true measure of Amuneke’s ceiling and more like a stalled adjustment year.
That is what makes him an intriguing bounce-back candidate in the portal.
Another staff can reasonably look at his size, his previous shooting track record and the underlying catch-and-shoot numbers and see a player worth betting on, especially one who still has two seasons of eligibility remaining. For Amuneke, the question this offseason was whether he wanted to remain patient with that development at WSU or search for a situation with a clearer path to minutes and more defined offensive role.
Tuesday’s decision answered that question.
It appears Amuneke will look for a better fit elsewhere, while Wichita State continues to reshape its roster around the players who helped define its late-season identity.
The Shockers have already received public commitments from senior center Will Berg, junior forward Dillon Battie, sophomore wing T.J. Williams, senior guard Mike Gray Jr., sophomore center Noah Hill, freshman wing Tyrus Rathan-Mayes, freshman guard Pierre Couisnard and senior guard Henry Thengvall to return next season. Those returners represent a significant chunk of the program’s continuity, especially after WSU leaned heavily on defense, rebounding and second-chance production during its surge late in the season.
The only two players who have not made a public announcement about their plans are junior forward Jaret Valencia, who is still rehabilitating an Achilles injury, and junior wing Joy Ighovodja.
There is also still the Emmanuel Okorafor situation to monitor. The senior center is working on an NCAA waiver that could grant him another year of eligibility, a development that would further affect WSU’s scholarship math and frontcourt planning.
Under the current 15-man roster limit, Wichita State now has five open scholarships to work with for its 2026 recruiting class.
That number gives Mills and his staff flexibility, but it also sharpens the focus of what still needs to be addressed in the portal. Kindell’s departure already highlighted the need for more point guard help. Amuneke’s exit now adds another vacancy on the wing, even if his role was limited, and leaves WSU continuing to search for the right blend of shooting and playmaking around the returning core.
This story was originally published April 7, 2026 at 9:55 AM.
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