The NCAA men’s basketball transfer portal opened at midnight on April 7, 2026, and within hours, the numbers were already staggering. With 2,901 players entering the portal in just the first 14 hours, nearly half the entire Division I player pool was suddenly on the move, sending shockwaves across college basketball programs nationwide.
The chaos did not go unnoticed by NBA players either. New York Knicks guard Josh Hart, a Villanova product who knows the college game inside and out, took to social media to offer his quick-fire take on the situation, and his five-word response has since gone viral.
What Did Josh Hart Say About the Ongoing NCAA Transfer Portal?
When presented with the alarming figure that 2,901 players had entered the men’s basketball transfer portal in just 14 hours after it opened, with only 5,607 Division I players total, meaning more than half the player pool was now looking for a new home, Hart did not mince words.
They need 2 year contracts https://t.co/8YPkVIWM8f
— Josh Hart (@joshhart) April 7, 2026
His reply was blunt and to the point.”They need 2-year contracts,” the Knicks star said on X.
It is a short statement, but it carries a lot of weight. Hart suggests that if college players were tied to two-year commitments rather than free to leave whenever the portal opens, the rampant player movement that has come to define the modern era of college basketball might be significantly reined in.
The idea is simple: bring some form of contractual stability to college rosters, something similar to what professional leagues operate under.
Hart himself is no stranger to the Villanova program and what it means to build something over multiple years. During his time with the Wildcats, he was part of the 2016 national championship team and developed into a consensus first-team All-American by his senior season in 2017. His perspective on the transfer portal comes from someone who deeply understands both the college and professional sides of basketball.
The scale of this year’s portal activity is genuinely unprecedented. The NCAA announced in January that the transfer window would open for 15 days, starting the day after the national championship game.
That means this cycle runs from April 7 through April 21, 2026. Given the volume of entries on day one alone, coaches across the country are scrambling to retain their current rosters while simultaneously identifying targets to fill the gaps left by departing players.
The timing has been particularly brutal for programs with new head coaches. With nearly 50 coaching changes happening this offseason, many newly hired coaches have had little to no time to evaluate their inherited rosters before the portal opened.
UNC, for instance, hired Michael Malone, and with the portal already live, he is being thrown straight into the fire without even an official announcement from the school yet.
Hart’s comment taps into a growing frustration felt across college basketball. Coaches, fans, and analysts have all wrestled with how to balance player freedom with roster continuity.
The one-time transfer rule was initially welcomed as a way to give players more agency, but the scale at which the portal is now operating has raised serious questions about sustainability. When more than half of all Division I players are in the portal within a single day, something has clearly shifted in the structure of college basketball as we know it.
From a professional standpoint, Hart’s suggestion makes intuitive sense. In the NBA, players operate under guaranteed multi-year contracts that provide stability for both players and franchises. A two-year commitment at the college level would not eliminate player movement entirely, but it would add a layer of accountability and planning that the current system arguably lacks.
Whether the NCAA ever moves toward a contract-style system remains to be seen. But with the 2026 portal shattering records on day one, conversations like the one Hart sparked are only going to get louder as college basketball searches for answers.
