Tuesday brought a final commitment for Weber State men’s basketball and the “closure” of the transfer portal, setting the Wildcats’ roster of scholarship players for the 2025-26 season.
Junior college wing/forward Edwin Suarez announced his commitment to Weber State on Instagram. The 6-foot-6 player from Arizona Western College was this season’s player of the year for the Arizona Community College Athletic Conference and he was named an NJCAA third-team All-American.
His output this season came in 23 minutes per game, averaging 13.4 points, 8.7 rebounds, 1.8 assists and 1.5 steals per game. He shot 53.7% from the field and 40% on a 10-of-25 sample from the 3-point line.
Film shows Suarez to possess skills that should bolster the Wildcats in a few ways. He’s tough in the paint, as evidenced by his field goal percentage and his 3.4 offensive rebounds per game. Highlights seem to show a player more athletic and skilled than his forward-like stats would indicate, getting out in the open court with some speed, playing as a rim-runner and lob threat, and disrupting defensively on the perimeter.
His top games in conference play came in a 15-rebound performance against the College of Southern Nevada and a pair of 24-point outings against Central Arizona and Eastern Arizona. His final junior college game saw Suarez total 19 points and 13 rebounds in the conference tournament title game, a three-point loss to regular-season champion Eastern Arizona.
A United States citizen born in Puerto Rico, Suarez played high school basketball in Reading, Pennsylvania. In six games at the 2022 FIBA Americas U18 tournament, he averaged 11.5 points and 7.7 rebounds per game playing for the Dominican Republic, his mother’s native country. He turns 21 years old this week.
Suarez gives Weber State men’s basketball 13 committed or signed scholarship players for next season. The transfer portal period closed Tuesday night for undergraduate players to submit their names and be immediately eligible next season; no additional entries from WSU were known or reported as of Wednesday afternoon.
Forward Nigel Burris is one of five returners from last season and the lone senior on the roster.
As juniors, Viljami Vartiainen returns as one of the Big Sky’s best 3-point shooters. Guard Jace Whiting (UNLV) and forward Malek Gomma (Seattle) arrive as Division I transfers. Suarez is the lone junior college entry, while point guard Tijan Saine (Western Washington) represents Weber State’s Division II recruit this offseason.
Sophomore guard Trevor Hennig returns after a freshman campaign in which he scored 10.1 points per game against Big Sky opponents, and center Declan Cutler also returns.
Redshirt forward David Hansen, who WSU hopes will boost the offense as a classic stretch four, returns as part of a group of five freshmen. The other four freshmen arrive from high school: guards ArDarius Grayson, Anthony Moore and Duce Paschal, and post player Bourgeois Tshilobo. Previously signed guard Melchi Egbeyemi will not be joining the team.
Moore, Paschal and Tshilobo all signed in the November 2024 early period. The regular period for signing high school graduates is now open for Grayson to finalize his signing.
From the 2024-25 season, Blaise Threatt, Dyson Koehler, Alex Tew, Miguel Tomley and Vasilije Vucinic played out their eligibility. Sophomore forward Marko Sarenac, redshirt freshman shooting guard Nemanja Sarenac, and freshman point guard Saadiq Moore entered their names in the transfer portal. Nemanja Sarenac signed with D2 Hawaii-Pacific.
The first date for 2025-26 regular-season games is Monday, Nov. 3. Oversight committees adopted a new calendar that standardizes the regular season for men’s and women’s basketball at 22 weeks. Previous rules had seasons fluctuate from 21 and 22 weeks in length, and start dates often conflicted with election day.
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