PJ Haggerty Lands at Texas A&M as His Fifth School in Five Years: The Most Traveled Star in College Basketball
If college basketball has a record book for transfer portal mileage, PJ Haggerty just took the top spot.
The guard, an AP All-American Honorable Mention and the AP Big 12 Transfer of the Year, has committed to Texas A&M for his final season of eligibility. The Aggies will be his fifth school in five seasons of college basketball.
The road that got him here
Haggerty’s path looks like a road trip across the AAC and Big 12. He started at TCU on a redshirt year. He played at Tulsa. He moved to Memphis. He landed at Kansas State for the 2025-26 season. Now he’s at Texas A&M.
At every stop except the redshirt, the production has been real. Haggerty averaged 23.4 points, 5.3 rebounds, and 3.8 assists at Kansas State this past season. Before that, he was the AAC Player of the Year at Memphis. He’s not a journeyman because he can’t play. He’s a journeyman because the college basketball roster cycle is now built to encourage movement.
What he brings to Texas A&M
Bucky McMillan’s roster just got an instant 20-point scorer. Haggerty is one of the most efficient combo guards in the country, and he plays with the kind of pace that A&M’s offense needs. He can run point. He can play off the ball. He defends both guard spots adequately. The fit is clean.
The Aggies were a tournament-caliber team last year and they just added the kind of perimeter star who turns a tournament team into a Final Four threat. That is not an exaggeration. Haggerty’s level of production travels.
The Kansas State exodus
The Wildcats are losing more than Haggerty. He’s now the fifth Kansas State player to enter the portal, joining Stephen Osei, Exavier Wilson, David Castillo, and Abdi Bashir Jr. That’s a roster gutting, and it leaves Jerome Tang’s program scrambling for replacements in a portal where the top names dry up by mid-May.
This is the brutal reality of modern college basketball. A coach can have a good season, even sign a great transfer like Haggerty, and watch the entire roster reshuffle the moment the buzzer sounds on the season.
The NCAA’s 5-in-5 model is looming
One of the biggest factors driving roster moves this offseason is the looming threat of the NCAA’s 5-in-5 eligibility model. The reform could fundamentally change how long players can stay in college and at how many schools. That uncertainty is forcing coaches and players to make moves now while the rules are clearer.
Haggerty’s decision to move again is also influenced by NIL economics. Texas A&M’s collective is one of the more aggressive in the country. A&M has the resources to pay a star transfer what he’s worth in the open market, and that almost certainly factored into the choice.
This is good for him
The transfer portal gets criticized constantly, but Haggerty’s story is the version that the system should celebrate. A player who needed a fresh start as a freshman found one. He outgrew the next school. He found a bigger stage. Now he’s getting paid and playing in the SEC against the best competition in the country.
That is professional development, packaged as college basketball.
What it means for the SEC
The SEC was already the deepest conference in college basketball. Adding a player like Haggerty makes Texas A&M a real factor in the conference race. Auburn, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Florida are still loaded. The Aggies just elevated themselves into that tier.
The conference is going to be a meat grinder again next season. Haggerty is the kind of player who shows up in the biggest games and puts up 25 points anyway.
The bottom line
PJ Haggerty has played for four schools and is committed to a fifth. He is one of the better guards in college basketball and he just landed in a place where he can win a lot of games. Kansas State has to retool. Texas A&M just got better.
Five schools in five years used to be a punchline. Now it’s just how some of the best college players navigate their careers.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
