Just a clarification. Of the 1300+ transfers in D1 WBB, only 1098 found a new home. The 200+ who did not were typically seniors/reserves who were not retained for a 5th season by their current team, and were hoping to hang on to another scholarship year anywhere else, thereby avoiding the inevitable requirement to get on with their life after college.
With the high number of transfers, that approximates the number of incoming freshmen each year, you could say a ranking of transfers might be roughly equivalent to the significance of high school rankings. By that logic #29 for Lou would be pretty good, but certainly not special by Uconn standards.
I do think Lou was underrated here and Bone Dogs points comparing the rating with Rivers is interesting. Rivers was worse than someone who just didn't get significant playing time and might fulfill their potential if given an opportunity. She got enough minutes for her stats to have some meaning, and those results were terrible. Not a little subpar, terrible as in way below average Division 1 player.
Do I think she will be that bad in the future? No, but when you have a first year that is as close to a complete bust as possible it raises significant doubts that she will ever be a positive contributor to a good program. She might be, and the standard deviation so to speak over what she becomes is wide, but it appears her transfer ranking is largely based on her ESPN high school rating.
Lou by comparison as a foreign player, probably was not rated by ESPN at all before coming to Fairfield. That lack of an official ESPN seal of approval probably hurts her in this rating. She also might be hurt by her anticipated role, since most projected her to be a good backup at Uconn. A good backup at Uconn might be better than a good starter at a lessor program, and a better player, but will not put up as impressive per game stats. Many of the players ahead of her might get more playing time or be more of a go to player on a less impressive team, but that doesn't necessarily make them a better player.
There are many different criteria you can use for this kind of a rating. One that I would argue in Lou's case is how important her addition was from the team's standpoint. At the time Uconn had only 4 players to cover 3 positions (1-3). Coming off a season where clearly 6 was not enough, because we sometimes had 3 out at the same time, this was clearly a major problem. We had to get a guard in the transfer portal and Lou filled a big need for a championship contender. Then when Paige got injured, we had to get another guard, the high school options for this year were gone, the portal candidates had made their decisions, and we pursued the only avenue left, and picked up Inez from abroad.
In terms of filling a serious need, with a proven performer we did very well with Lou. A player like Rivers might have more upside due to superior physical gifts, but if I was a betting man and the choice was who would have the better PER (player efficiency rating) for this season, I think I would pick Lou. Time will tell.
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