Florida State basketball: Georgetown transfer Primo Spears selects FSU

The roster reshape continues.

• By
  
  Matt Minnick
  
• on April 30, 2023 12:42 am

The transfer portal continues to churn and this time it is the Florida State Seminoles men’s basketball team passing “go” and collecting $200. Following a visit to Tallahassee, Amir “Primo” Spears, a 6’3 lead guard who spent this past season with the Georgetown Hoyas announced his intention to transfer to Florida State. Spears selected FSU over a reported top 4 of the Kansas Jayhawks, Arkansas Razorbacks, and TCU Horned Frogs:

In an interview from early April, Spears indicated that along with being part of a winning program, trust with the coaching staff and a “good brotherhood” were very important in his decision. This makes it seem likely that FSU’s recent hiring of former Georgetown Associate Head Coach Kevin Nickelberry played a key role in Spears ultimately selecting the garnet and gold.

What does Spears bring to FSU?

In a lot of ways, Spears appears similar to recently departed Seminoles transfer, Caleb Mills. Both are in the 6’3 – 6’4 range and both are around 180-185 pounds. Both guys are also more “scorers” than they are “shooters,” with Mills shooting 29% from deep this past year for FSU, while Primo connected on exactly 30% of his three point attempts during both his freshman sophomore campaigns. Similarly, both guys take a lot of difficult shots off the bounce, with highlight tapes showcasing arrays of made step-backs and pull-ups. Lastly, neither guy (at least on paper) is all that strong at rebounding the ball, though I admit that I don’t know the schemes Patrick Ewing was deploying at Georgetown well enough to know whether Spears was being asked to crash the glass or not.

One aspect Spears might bring a little more to the table than Mills is playmaking. An upcoming junior, Spears is now a two-time transfer, having spent his freshman season leading the Duquesne Dukes in scoring and assists. Then this past season as a Hoya, Spears had a 30.2% assist rate—meaning he assisted on 30% of the baskets made by his teammates while he was on the court. This not only led Georgetown, he also ranked third in the Big East.

Another aspect that popped on tape was how he attacks. Mills had the best handle on the team, but there were many occasions where he dribbled without a clear purpose or intent of attacking. Spears often appears more purposeful in how he’s using his handle to either get to his mid-range spots in the half court, or attack the basket as a blur in the open court. Examples of both these can be seen in his 19 point (on 8-17 shooting from the field), 5 rebound performance at eventual national champion Connecticut back in December:

What will be interesting to see is how his ball…