When Santos returned to action in the 2019-20 season with Loomis Chaffee, which is located in Windsor, Conn., he averaged 17.1 points, 6.0 rebounds and 1.3 assists per game. Then when he was a senior in the 2020-21 season, Loomis Chaffee played only three games because of the pandemic.
In two seasons at Pitt, Santos struggled to find playing time, averaging 9.8 minutes in 54 appearances. He’ll get a fresh start at Dayton as one of seven newcomers on a roster that now has 12 scholarship players.
“He’s got a beautiful jump shot,” Battistoni said Wednesday. “His base to his release, it’s always been a really good looking jump shot. It just comes off his hand easily. But he’s not just a shooter. He can score at all three levels. He’s got a lot of toughness to him. He can defend. He can handle the ball. He’s got great size. He’s got great physical makeup. He’s got a really good basketball IQ. He’s a good passer. He’s just all around good player. He does a lot of things really well.”
As a freshman at Pitt, Santos averaged 2.8 points and 1.9 rebounds in 12.8 minutes per game in 25 appearances. He started the first six games that season and scored 14 points in 37 minutes against Towson in the fourth game. Those remain career highs.
With Pitt off to a 2-4 start that season, Santos lost his starting job and then saw his playing time diminish. He did not top 20 minutes again until the second-to-last game of the season.
After making 4 of 8 3-pointers against Towson, Santos made 2 of 16 in his next seven appearances. He then made 2 of 3 against Syracuse, at which point coach Jeff Capel was asked about Santos’ role.
“He always has a chance to work his way into the rotation,” Capel told the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. “We have practices every day. We think Nate’s a good player. He has helped us this year. We think he can help us going forward. But those things are earned by what you do in practice on a day-to-day basis, not just because he made two shots today.”
Last season, Santos played even less than he did as a freshman. He averaged 1.6 points, 1.2 rebounds and 7.3 minutes in 29 games. He did not see action in six of the team’s last eight games.
“He was frustrated,” Battistoni said, “but I think he did a good job with any opportunity that came about to try to do his best. Like any kid of that caliber, any kid in general, they want to get on the floor, but he was still in a good good space mentally.”
The Panthers finished 24-12 and beat Mississippi State in the First Four at UD Arena. Santos did not play in that game but did play four minutes in the next round in a victory against Iowa State. He did not see action in the second round in a loss to Xavier.
Santos made 5 of 32 3-pointers (15.6%) as a sophomore after making 11 of 49 (22.4%) as a freshman.
“With any young player, it’s still a confidence thing,” Battistoni said. “If you’re getting limited action and limited touches, if you make a shot, then it builds your confidence, and if you don’t, then your confidence is down. Once he starts to see the ball going a little bit and starts feeling comfortable, I imagine Nate will be just fine.”
Santos entered the transfer portal on April 4.
“I think 15 years ago,” Battistoni said, “that’d be a kid who would never transfer and would stay at an ACC school and then make a big impact and a big jump by his junior year, but with the portal, it just doesn’t happen that way anymore. The kid has got all the tools, and he’s still getting better, too. I don’t think he has reached his potential.”
Santos falls into the category of players who transfer to Dayton after seeing limited minutes in a higher-ranked conference.
• Vee Sanford averaged 1.8 points in two seasons at Georgetown and 10.8 in two seasons at Dayton.
• Jordan Sibert averaged 2.5 points in two seasons at Ohio State and 14.1 in two seasons at Dayton.
• Ibi Watson averaged 1.8 points in two seasons at Michigan and 12.5 in two seasons at Dayton.
Like former Dayton forward Toumani Camara, who transferred to Dayton from Georgia in April 2021 after receiving a UD offer in 2018, Santos was also recruited in high school by UD. He received a scholarship offer from UD in April 2020.
Battistoni remembers Dayton coaches coming to visit Santos. They came to see another Loomis Chaffee player, R.J. Blakney, who committed to Dayton in October 2019, at the same time.
Santos originally was in the class of 2020 but reclassified to 2021 when he left Geneva High School in the western suburbs of Chicago to attend Loomis Chaffee starting in the 2018-19 season. He repeated his sophomore year to develop his game, Battistoni said, and that’s common for basketball players at the school. Santos will be 22 when the 2023-24 season begins.
Santos ended up at Loomis Chaffee, Battistoni said, because the family was familiar with East Coast boarding schools. KJ Santos, Nate’s older brother, played at Vermont Academy before a college career that took him to Illinois-Chicago and Missouri.
“It’s a bigger boarding school,” Battistoni said, “and there are a lot of opportunities here, not just basketball but academic opportunities with kids from all over the world. It’s a pretty unique experience, and that’s what they wanted, and that’s what he bought into.”
The rest of Nate’s family has basketball experience as well. One sister, Sidney, played at Oakland University. Another, Ashley, played at Marquette and Louisiana Tech.
Their dad, Joe Santos, played professionally in Puerto Rico. Their mom, Lori, played at Wichita State.
Battistoni kept in touch with Santos throughout the recruiting process this spring.
“We talked about Dayton just being as a basketball town,” he said. “You’re playing in front of great fans in a great facility. It’s a great league, a really good coaching staff. It checks a lot of boxes.”
About the Author
