Former Northwestern target Charlie Moore is transferring from Cal to be closer to his Chicago home

California point guard Charlie Moore is transferring to be closer to his hometown of Chicago, Moore and the program announced Thursday night.

According to ESPN’s Jeff Goodman, Moore wants to be closer to home to be near his father, who is dealing with undisclosed health issues.

Moore averaged 12.2 points and 3.5 assists per game for the Golden Bears as a freshman and was voted a Pac 12 All-Freshman Team Honorable Mention.

While starring at Morgan Park High School in Chicago, Moore was a four-star recruit and the No. 1 player in Illinois, landing 20+ Division 1 offers. He committed to Memphis in November of 2015, but after coach Josh Pastner left for Georgia Tech in April 2016, Moore de-committed and re-opened his recruitment. Northwestern was one of the first teams to call but didn’t make Moore’s final eight.

With no scholarships open at the time and Johnnie Vassar’s not opening up until recently, Chris Collins was never able to officially offer Moore.

Still, Moore definitely had interest at the time.

Now, with Moore indicating he wants to transfer to a school closer to home, Northwestern would seem to stand at least a solid chance at landing the talented guard.

Moore would have to sit out a year, but that would actually fit perfectly at Northwestern with star point guard Bryant McIntosh graduating in 2018. Moore would then play his redshirt sophomore season at the renovated Welsh-Ryan Arena and presumably have the starting spot to himself.

With a 247 composite score of 0.9717, the 2016 Illinois Mr. Basketball winner would be Northwestern’s best player ever by recruiting ranking. Despite struggling with efficiency as a freshman, Moore flashed his elite scoring ability all season long, including a 38-point explosion in his second career game against UC Irvine.

Collins and Northwestern’s biggest competition would figure to be Illinois, which has a strong incoming freshman class and a new coach in Brad Underwood. DePaul, who was strongly interested in Moore last year, would be the most appealing option of the three from a location standpoint but had the least on-court success in 2016-17.

Moore didn’t specify how close to Chicago he wants to be, so perhaps he will consider places like Iowa, Iowa State or Missouri as well. One potential factor in Moore’s choice could be the college decision of 2017 point guard Mark Smith, who is considering Illinois, Northwestern and Missouri among several others.