Ole Miss basketball gets commitment from three-star forward KJ Buffen

Published 7:57 pm Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Ole Miss landed its first commitment of the Kermit Davis era Wednesday.

Gainesville High (Georgia) three-star forward KJ Buffen announced his verbal pledge to the Rebels with a post to his Twitter account. Buffen, rated the No. 11 player in Georgia and the nation’s No. 217 overall prospect in the 247Sports.com composite rankings, also had offers from Georgia State, Wyoming and Arkansas State among others.

“Thank you to all the coaches that have reached out to me, but after really sitting down and thinking about it, I’ve decided to further my academic and basketball career with The University of Mississippi,” part of Buffen’s social media post read.

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Buffen’s commitment isn’t all that surprising given that the 6-foot-7, 205-pounder was originally committed to Davis at Middle Tennessee State before backing off that pledge once Davis was hired at Ole Miss in March. Buffen joins signees Brian Halumns and Zach Naylor in the Rebels’ 2018 class.

His pledge leaves Ole Miss with three scholarships available for the current class. Some of the Rebels’ top targets include Sunrise Christian (Wichita, Kansas) three-star forward Blake Hinson and Upson-Lee (Thomaston, Georgia) three-star guard Tye Fagan, another former MTSU commitment.

Davis recently told the EAGLE there’s a possibility one of those scholarships could also be held for a transfer with multiple years of eligibility left that would be required to sit out next season to fulfill NCAA transfer rules.