With the implementation of NIL deals within college sports, the transfer portal has been an evergrowing part of the sport, with more players entering the portal than ever before. And one anonymous college basketball insider known only as ‘Trilly Donovan’ on Twitter has accurately been first to a number of transfer portal beats this offseason.
Donovan, who’s social media account is an ode to former Florida head coach and current Chicago Bulls head coach Billy Donovan, broke a number of unforeseen breaking stories before anyone else this offseason. This includes North Carolina transfer Caleb Love’s issues with having his credits transfer over at Michigan, leading to him instead joining Arizona.
On top of that, he accurately predicted these five head coaches landing in their eventual landing spots below.
Here’s a semi-realistic hypothetical for you:
Ed Cooley to Georgetown
Rick Pitino to St. John’s
Kim English to Providence
Tobin Anderson or Kimani Young to Iona
Tony Skinn to George Mason— Trilly Donovan (@trillydonovan) March 17, 2023
Not every prediction or scoop has turned out to be correct from Trilly Donovan, but the percentage of correct reports from him compared to incorrect reports certainly suggests that whoever he is, he certainly has some sort of inside knowledge around the sport.
Donovan even made his own website called Burnerball.com, where he offers his beats along with “Trilly predictions” on unreported scoops.
Donovan discussed this new website along with his hidden identity with CJ Moore of The Athletic, where he revealed that he believes keeping his mystique is important.
“I gotta be careful,” Donovan told Moore. “Because it’s one of those things where it’s not like nothing’s gonna incriminate me or anything like that. A lot of this is just about keeping it anonymous. Keeping the mystique behind it is important. So I don’t know if I can really get into exactly what I do, but I’m in a position and all of the people involved are in a position where we’re able to get some information before some other people. And that’s probably all I’ll say about that.”
The world may never know the real identity behind Trilly Donovan, but it looks like whoever is behind the account is here to stay amongst the top insiders in college basketball.
