Column: As former Cougs like Myles Rice find new homes, they deserve our respect
PULLMAN – After a while, it became clear Myles Rice was getting tired of telling the same story. As he led Washington State back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 16 years, stealing the show as the Cougars’ lead ball-handler and scorer, he began doing scores of interviews about his journey.
His understated recruitment. His cancer diagnosis. His recovery. His relationship with his mother Tamara, and the way his WSU coaches and teammates supported him the whole way.
Privately, Rice was ready to move on and talk about something else – talk about basketball. He likened his story to a novel, explaining that his cancer and recovery resembled Chapter 1, but now he and the Cougs were in Chapter 2. Internally, Rice had transitioned long ago. The fans and media new to his story weren’t doing so.
But throughout the whole year, Rice maintained patience and grace, granting interviews to national outlets, giving away his time like candy at a parade. So polite was Rice that the team’s communications director had to designate certain days for Rice’s interviews so he wasn’t exhausting himself by doing them every day.
As Rice transfers to Indiana and starts Chapter 3, can we agree to give him the same grace – and do the same for all the Cougs’ transfers?
The topic is timely because earlier this week, Rice was quoted in an Indiana 247 Sports story as saying, “I can never thank coach (Mike) Woodson enough for giving me a chance to be part of Indiana, what the coaching is, what the history is, alongside these players and brothers that I’ll have for the rest of my life. It’s the first time in a long time I felt I’ve really been wanted.”
The last bit caused a stir in some corners of the WSU fanbase, which interpreted the quote as Rice saying he didn’t feel wanted in Pullman. It doesn’t really read that way – it seems likelier Rice was expressing his appreciation for the Hoosiers’ strong push, especially because he has on multiple occasions shared his gratitude for the WSU community. It’s reassuring to know the majority of Coug fans seemed to side with Rice – but either way, it’s high time the fans deriding transfers like Rice take a step back and operate with some compassion.
Take Rice’s case: He’s a 21-year-old cancer survivor who chose to attend college on the other side of the country, nearly 2,500 miles away from his hometown of Atlanta, and didn’t see the court for either of his first two seasons. In his first season back in action, mere months after he was declared cancer-free, he led the Cougs to their first NCAA Tournament since 2008 – including winning a game there.
What about former wing Jaylen Wells, who is preparing to hear his name called in this month’s NBA draft? A northern California native, he bet on himself and transferred from Division II Sonoma (California) State to Power Five Washington State, entered the starting lineup in the middle of Pac-12 play and had one of the most iconic moments in program history, a four-point play to beat then-No. 4 Arizona on the road. After the season, he declared for the NBA draft and as a means of keeping all his options open, he entered the transfer portal – which angered portions of the WSU fanbase.
We could go on and on with the former Cougs who deserve the opportunities they’ve earned – former wing Andrej Jakimovski is using his grad transfer year to play at Colorado, center Rueben Chinyelu earned a spot at Florida and wing Kymany Houinsou landed at Loyola Chicago – but the truth is no matter their talent level, no matter their points per game or wins and losses, these young men decided their lives were better served elsewhere. You don’t have to like it, but you should understand it.
After all, these guys didn’t come to Washington State to play in the West Coast Conference, which WSU is joining on an affiliate basis in the aftermath of the Pac-12’s collapse. They wanted to challenge themselves to play at the Power Five level, and the Cougs no longer enjoy that status, at least not the way we know it. This isn’t the opportunity these players signed up for when they committed to WSU.
Now is about when critics respond with something about loyalty, or something about sticking with the school that gave them a chance, or something about the grass not being greener. Look at guys like DJ Rodman, they’ll say, or look at TJ Bamba. Didn’t work out so well for those guys, huh?
The problem is we’re looking at these issues through the lens of basketball, through a prism where we use a player’s stats – or the team’s win-loss ledger – to decide whether someone should have transferred. Rodman’s USC team struggled last season, the thinking goes, so certainly he regrets his decision. Bamba’s numbers dropped off for a middling Villanova club, so he’s probably wishing he was still at WSU.
Guess what? Some of these decisions have less to do with basketball and more to do with quality of life. Rodman needed the NIL opportunities USC could provide. Bamba, a New York native, wanted to be closer to home, and he figured the Wildcats’ prestigious program would propel him to the NBA. For his part, Rice is also moving much closer to home.
Maybe these guys do regret transferring away from Washington State. Maybe they saw the Cougs’ magical run last season and thought, “Man, I could have been a part of that.” Maybe their careers would have unfolded differently if they stayed on the Palouse. They probably wouldn’t admit it publicly, but it’s possible.
If they went back and erased that decision, they’d erase part of themselves. They wouldn’t be who they are now if they had stayed at WSU, for better or worse, but it’s part of their story now. We are all a product of our experiences and decisions, trying to find our place in a complicated world, and for the players who elect to transfer away, their lives will be colored by their stay in Pullman and their lives after it. They deserve our support, no matter how many points they’re putting up.
Do you feel good about every decision you made at age 20?
Greg Woods can be reached at 509-459-5587 or at gregw@spokesman.com.