Aberdeen and Alexis planning to leave Florida, Michigan State adds Fort from the transfer portal

Denzel Aberdeen and Sam Alexis have entered the transfer portal, planning to leave Florida after helping the school win the men's basketball national championship.

Aberdeen and Alexis announced their moves on Friday, joining Gators guard Kajus Kublickas in the portal.

The 6-foot-5 Aberdeen appeared to be in line to start in the backcourt next season, but is looking to play elsewhere after former Princeton guard Xaivian Lee recently committed to transfer to Florida.

The Gators are also losing All-American Walter Clayton Jr., along with fellow standout guards Alijah Martin and Will Richard. All three expect to play professionally next season.

Aberdeen averaged 7.7 points last season, starting in five of 39 games. He averaged five points a game over the last three seasons. Aberdeen scored a career-high 22 points, making 5 of 7 3-pointers, against South Carolina and had 20 points in two other games late in the season.

Alexis scored 4.7 points a game as a reserve in 24 games last season, one year after the 6-9 forward averaged nearly 11 points as a sophomore at Chattanooga.

Michigan State, meanwhile, added a well-traveled player from the portal.

Trey Fort, a 24-year-old guard, averaged 14.6 points last season at Samford. He started his career at UT Martin in 2020, then played at two junior colleges, and moved onto Mississippi State and Samford.

The Spartans previously landed forward Kaleb Glenn, who played at Louisville two years ago and Florida Atlantic last season, from the portal to make up for some of their losses.

Hall of Fame coach Tom Izzo lost Jase Richardson to the NBA draft, three players in the portal — Tre Holloman, Xavier Booker and Gehrig Normand — along with three players out of eligibility, including Jaden Akins.

Earlier in the week, Auburn guard Chad Baker-Mazara and Memphis star PJ Haggerty entered the transfer portal.

Baker-Mazara, who turned 25 in January, started 34 games and was the Tigers’ second-leading scorer last season. He averaged a career-high 12.3 points during Auburn's run to the Final Four. Baker-Mazara has one year of eligibility left because of a temporary waiver giving student-athletes who previously competed at a non-NCAA school a fourth season at an NCAA school in 2025-26.

All-American and leading scorer Johni Broome, Denver Jones, Dylan Cardwell and Miles Kelly have used up their college eligibility, taking away Auburn's entire starting five from last season’s top-seeded overall team in the NCAA tournament.

Haggerty was the nation's third-leading scorer last season, averaging 21.7 points along with 5.8 rebounds and 3.7 steals while helping Memphis play in the NCAA Tournament. He will be headed for his fourth program in four years. Haggerty appeared in six games as a freshman for TCU, then averaged 21.2 points as a redshirt freshman at Tulsa before making the move within the American Athletic Conference to Memphis.

Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball

Florida guard Denzel Aberdeen celebrates after after their win against the Houston in the national championship at the Final Four of the NCAA college basketball tournament, Monday, April 7, 2025, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

Auburn's Chad Baker-Mazara (10) celebrates during the first half in the national semifinals at the Final Four of the NCAA college basketball tournament, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. wholesale prices dropped unexpectedly in April for the first time in more than a year despite President Donald Trump’s sweeping taxes on imports.

The producer price index — which tracks inflation before it hits consumers — fell 0.5% last month from March, the first drop since October 2023 and the biggest in five years. Compared to a year earlier, producer prices rose 2.4% last month, decelerating from a 3.4% year-over-year gain in March, the U.S. Labor Department reported Thursday.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core wholesale prices dipped 0.4% from March and rose 3.1% from a year earlier.

Economists had forecast that producer prices rose modestly in April.

Services prices fell 0.7%, the biggest drop in government records going back to 2009, on shrinking profit margins at wholesalers and retailers. Wholesale food prices fell 1%, and egg prices plunged 39%, though they are still up nearly 45% from a year ago because of bird flu.

On Tuesday, the Labor Department reported that consumer prices rose just 2.3% last month from April 2024 — smallest year-over-year gain in more than four years.

Economists have predicted that Trump’s tariffs would drive up prices, and many expect the impact to show up in June or July.

Still, Trump’s tariffs are ever-changing, so it’s hard to forecast their economic impact. On Monday, for instance, Trump unexpectedly agreed to a massive de-escalation of his trade war with China — third-biggest source of U.S. imports — by scaling back his taxes on Chinese products to 30% from 145%; China slashed its retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products from 125% to 10%.

FILE - A customer checks his shopping receipts while waiting in line at the food court at Costco Wholesale store in Glendale, Calif., on Thursday, April 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, File)

FILE - A motorist fills up the gasoline tank of a vehicle at a Costco warehouse Tuesday, April 1, 2025, in Thornton, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)