‘Hell Yeah I’m Still Interested’: How Jacie Hoyt Built Oklahoma State’s Best Portal Class in the Country

STILLWATER — Having just finished up a positive visit with All-SEC first team selection Liv McGill, Jacie Hoyt had a text message from Audi Crooks, the top player in the transfer portal.

“‘Hey Coach, are you still interested?'” Hoyt recalled. “I’m like, ‘Hell yeah I’m still interested.’ This is amazing. I think we’re gonna get Liv, and now Audi is texting me.”

Hoyt said she had a great conversation with Crooks when she first hit the portal but things went dark for a little bit from both sides — something Hoyt said is common in the speed dating that is the transfer portal. Hoyt said she was starting to think Crooks just wasn’t interested. Again, something that happens when you’re looking to fill basically an entire roster.

From there, they set Crooks up with a visit to Stillwater. Hoyt said when she picked Crooks up at the airport it felt like she had known Crooks her whole life.

Although it hasn’t been exactly that long, Hoyt said she did recruit Crooks back when she was coaching at UMKC before Crooks turned into a two-time All-American at Iowa State.

Any worries of whether Crooks would enjoy life in Stillwater were quickly washed away when Crooks — from Algona, Iowa, a town of about 5,000 — got excited to see the pond in Hoyt’s backyard. Hoyt said the OSU staff made a concerted effort to not make it feel like they were putting on a show with Crooks being in town but rather were just real with her.

It worked. Late on April 19, Crooks announced her commitment to Oklahoma State.

“Audi goes in the portal, and there’s this whole buffet of options and everything sounds really great,” Hoyt said, “but when you get down to the heart of what’s really important to you, I think that’s when she kind of circled back.”

Of the 10 Cowgirls from last season’s roster who could return, only Stailee Heard did. Hoyt said she had a feeling a big roster overhaul was a possibility — even before the Cowgirls went to Los Angeles for the NCAA Tournament.

“I could feel it coming,” Hoyt said. “I’m gonna be honest, I had a lot of conversations with our players on that team that I knew the chance of them leaving was very, very high. I was anticipating it. I knew it when we went out to California, to be honest. It was something that I also felt was hard kinda knowing while I was coaching in the tournament that I’m probably not gonna have this team next year.”

The Cowgirls lost to eventual national champ UCLA on March 23. The portal didn’t open until April 6.

“In that week or whatever it was … that’s a hard time,” Hoyt said. “Because you just have to sit on (the fact that only one player is on the roster). You’ve got a lot of thoughts and what-ifs going on, but my staff was really great. And we just stuck together like we always do, and then when the portal opened and you start to have those conversations, it was so refreshing and so energizing and felt so good to hear the feedback from other kids and what their perception of us is.

“That was very therapeutic, honestly, once the portal opens just to have those conversations with kids who want to be here. I want kids who want to be here, and every single one of our kids that we have on this roster, they want to be here for very specific reasons and they’re very motivated. I’m really excited about that.”

Crooks’ commitment was the exclamation point, but Hoyt and her staff were killing in the portal even before that. Various outlets listed the Cowgirls’ portal haul as the best in the country.

Along with Crooks, McGill — a point guard transfer from Florida — averaged 22.5 points a game as a sophomore in the SEC last season.

Rutgers transfer Nene Ndiaye broke out to the tune of 14.8 points a game last season in the Big Ten.

Lindenwood transfer Ellie Brueggemann averaged 14 points a game last season while shooting 44% from 3 on 218 attempts.

LA Sneed was a five-star prospect who averaged 6.3 points and 3.3 assists a game as a freshman at Utah last season, bringing more Big 12 experience into the fold.

Talexa Weeter is the reigning Division-II Player of the Year after averaging 27.5 points a game at Fort Hays State.

One after another, they felt like massive pieces the Cowgirls were adding. Hoyt said her portal experience helped prime her to make such a run. Her first OSU roster after being hired ahead of the 2022-23 season had just five holdovers on it, as Hoyt went and snagged the likes of Naomie Alnatas, Lior Garzon and Terryn Milton out of the portal and made a run to the NCAA Tournament. She just about had to do the same the next season with much of that first group being seniors.

With all the excitement around this offseason’s additions, it can be easy to forget that the roster also features Heard, who has been the most impactful player of the Hoyt Era. Entering her senior season, Heard already ranks in the Top 10 in program history in career points, rebounds, assists, steals and double-doubles.

“Stailee and I are one in the same — we’re connected at the hip,” Hoyt said. “We both knew what was coming this offseason before our season even ended, and we were in sync and in stride together every step of the way.

“The great thing about her, whether it’s on the court or off the court, is she has this maturity that she can think like a coach. So, I just told her, ‘I’m gonna need your help recruiting, and I’m gonna tell you who we’re talking to and how these conversations are going. I’m gonna need help on visits, and I need you to help me. I need to you to tell me if someone’s not a good fit or what you’re feeling or sensing.’ She was able to do that. She was basically a part of the coaching staff this offseason.”

So, now Hoyt gets to put it all together.

Hoyt said McGill fits “like a glove” into OSU’s style of play. A lot has already been said about how exactly Crooks will fit into Hoyt’s up-tempo style. It doesn’t sound as if the Cowgirl coach is all that worried about it.

“I think that’s the obvious thing that people think immediately, but Audi came here because she wanted to be a part of our style,” Hoyt said. “And I don’t intend on changing that. Am I gonna need to make some tweaks here and there? Of course. You have to do that every year, but Audi is very motivated to play in a system that she feels can help her go to the next level. …

“I think she’s excited to fit into us. We’re not changing everything for Audi, and Audi doesn’t want that. Audi wants to be pushed. She wants to be in a system that is gonna help develop her and push her in ways that she hasn’t been pushed, and that’s the goal for all of us.”