{"id":232184,"date":"2026-04-02T18:29:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T18:29:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/232184\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T18:29:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T18:29:10","slug":"matas-vokietaitis-unsure-about-return-to-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/232184\/","title":{"rendered":"Matas Vokietaitis unsure about return to Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Will rising junior center Matas Vokietaitis return to the Forty Acres for another season with the Texas Longhorns?<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Don\u2019t expect a quick resolution to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.burntorangenation.com\/nba-texas-longhorns\/101267\/dailyn-swain-nba-draft-matas-vokietaitis-texas-longhorns\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">one of the most important offseason questions<\/a> facing Sean Miller\u2019s program \u2014 on Thursday, Vokietaitis told Kirk Bohls of the Houston Chronicle, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/kbohls\/status\/2039710181974499800?s=46\" rel=\"nofollow\">We\u2019ll see,<\/a>\u201d when asked about whether he\u2019ll be back in Austin next year during a chance airport encounter.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Vokietaitis averaged 15.6 points and 7.1 rebounds per game at Texas in 2025-26 after earning AAC Freshman of the Year recognition at Florida Atlantic, helping to fuel a surprise run from the First Four to the Sweet 16 for the Longhorns.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">As a fringe NBA Draft prospect who will have a long professional basketball career somewhere, Vokietaitis could be more valuable as a college basketball player over the next two years than he will be as a professional, increasing the pressure to maximize his earnings now and thereby increasing the probability that he will enter the NCAA transfer portal again to secure the biggest deal possible on the open market.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The portal window opens on Tuesday, giving the Longhorns several days to negotiate with Vokietaitis\u2019 agent as the 7\u20190, 255-pounder enjoys his vacation and considers his future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Will rising junior center Matas Vokietaitis return to the Forty Acres for another season with the Texas Longhorns?&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":232185,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,13558,28],"class_list":["post-232184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-longhorns-basketball","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232184\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}