Will Wade returned to LSU earlier this year with just one player on the roster. With the transfer portal closed, the men’s basketball coach said he planned to hit the international recruiting trail hard to rebuild the squad.
He wasn’t kidding. Recent reports have made it clear Wade is building an international superteam in Baton Rouge.
Wade was fired from LSU in 2022 for violating NCAA recruiting rules. Now, four years later, those rules are much less clear. And Wade is testing them—to the extreme.
This week, the Tigers reportedly landed a pair of commitments from professionals in former St. John’s player R.J. Luis and Saliou Niang, who was the No. 58 pick in the 2025 NBA draft and played in Italy this past season. Niang has never signed an NBA contract.
Luis spent the past season in the G League after winning Big East Player of the Year in 2024–25 and signed a two-way contract with the Jazz in June.
