Jerrod Calhoun was named Cincinnati’s head basketball coach on Tuesday morning. Just a few hours later, the most pressing question wasn’t about his staff, his scheme, or his timeline. It was simpler: is he coming alone?
Calhoun graduated from Cincinnati in 2004 and learned the game under Bob Huggins. He climbed from Walsh to West Virginia, was part of the 2010 Final Four staff, then built his own identity at Fairmont State and Youngstown State before arriving in Logan. At Utah State, he went 55-15, taking Utah State to back-to-back NCAA Tournaments.
Now he’s home on a six-year deal worth $3.7 million annually. In the Big 12, coaches no longer have a long leash to build their program over several years. Relevance isn’t built over time — it’s bought, assembled, and proven in months.
The expectation is to win now. Calhoun knows that.
Which is why the next few weeks aren’t really about him at all.
Mason Falslev: The Man Who Keeps Choosing Calhoun
Utah State had one of the best guards in the country in Mason Falslev and he’d immediately become one of the top guards available if he entered the transfer portal.
The 6-foot-4 junior from northern Utah just won Mountain West Player of the Year. He averaged 16.1 points, 5.8 rebounds, 3.2 assists, and 1.9 steals, while shooting 52% from the field and 41.1% from three. He was the offensive engine behind everything Calhoun built: the decision-maker, shot-maker, and closer in the clutch. In the NCAA Tournament, he dropped 22 on Villanova to go along with seven rebounds, four assists, and the go-ahead jumper with 1:37 left. He makes it look easy and lets the game come to him.
But what separates this from a simple Player-of-the-Year transferring up is that Falslev has already chosen Calhoun twice. When Danny Sprinkle left for Washington after 2023-24, Falslev entered the portal, then pulled out the moment Calhoun was hired.
“It was a pretty easy decision,” he said. He stayed again last spring, turning down high-major interest to return for his junior season. This is not a player who chases opportunity. He chases a coach.
Now that coach has moved, and Falslev has one senior season to showcase his talents for the NBA. Cincinnati offers a Big 12 stage Utah State cannot approach and an NIL pool north of $8 million — nearly four times what the Aggies operated with this year.
More than that, it offers the exact offensive system Falslev knows how to thrive in, on a platform where the whole country will be watching.
Adlan Elamin: The Long Game
Adlan Elamin is a different situation, but an equally important one.
The 6-foot-8 freshman from Paul VI Catholic in Fairfax, Virginia was Calhoun’s own recruit — a four-star prospect who chose Utah State over VCU and Iowa specifically because of Calhoun’s staff. He averaged just under three points in 19 minutes per game off the bench, but the ceiling was visible all season.
In the Mountain West Championship, he punctuated a decisive second-half run with a put-back dunk that swung the momentum and the building at the same time. Elamin had one of his best games of the season in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, putting up 13 points, 7 rebounds, and 3 assists against Villanova. He’s a project with huge upside who has entrusted Calhoun with developing his game.
After starting the season on the bench, Elamin earned Calhoun’s trust, playing 20 minutes or more in 15 of the final 22 games of the season while averaging 27.5 minutes per game in two NCAA Tournament games.
When a coach leaves, his direct recruits face a simple fork: follow him, or start over with a new coach who may not believe in you the same way. Calhoun, at Cincinnati, is a known commodity and Elamin has three years of eligibility, which should give Cincinnati an edge in the race for the talented freshman.
What This Means
Neither player has entered the portal yet. But in today’s college basketball, that can change within hours.
What’s already true: two of Utah State’s best players had their careers shaped by the man who just left, and both had specific reasons to trust him above the open market. Falslev chose him when he could have left. Elamin chose him when he could have gone anywhere.
The next few weeks will tell whether Jerrod Calhoun’s homecoming begins with a press conference — or a roster.
