Virginia Guard Leon Bond III to Enter the Transfer Portal

Matt Newton | Apr 6, 2024

Leon Bond III attempts a jump shot during the Virginia men's basketball game at Memphis. / Petre Thomas-USA TODAY Sports

It took a few weeks, but the UVA men's basketball program has its first portal entry of the offseason. Redshirt freshman guard Leon Bond III heavily implied that his time at Virginia has come to an end in an Instagram story he posted on Saturday which said "Thank you Virginia. You will have my heart forever."

Unless we're somehow reading too much into it, that would appear to indicate that Bond is planning to enter the transfer portal.

It's not a surprising development, as Bond has played just 24 games and 296 total minutes in his first two years at Virginia. A four-star recruit coming out of high school in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, Bond redshirted his first season and then played sparingly this season, averaging 12.3 minutes per contest and 4.1 points per game, but not playing much more than garbage time minutes for most of ACC play.

Somewhat stuck between being a guard and a forward, Virginia opted for other options at both the third guard spot (Andrew Rohde, Taine Murray) and the power forward position (Ryan Dunn, Jake Groves) leaving Bond as the odd man out. And although there might've been some opportunity for Bond to get increased minutes next season, there was no guarantee of that coming to fruition. So this is a reasonable move for his basketball career.

Bond enters the transfer portal with three years of eligibility remaining.

With Bond entering the transfer portal, Virginia now has two open scholarship spots for the 2024-2025 season.