And so far, it seems to be paying off with star recruits like Jayden Daniels
Winning championships has sort of become common practice for LSU recently.
The women’s basketball team made history in April by securing the school’s first NCAA Tournament title. Months later, the Tiger baseball team clinched its seventh College World Series crown.
And while it may feel like forever ago, it’s only been four years since LSU Football took the nation by storm with an undefeated national championship run.
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At the heart of each of those title-winning teams was a star player who emerged as the face of the program throughout the season.
Angel Reese stole the show after her stellar tournament performance. Paul Skenes dominated the baseball headlines all season long. And Joe Burrow quickly became a household name while leading LSU back to the pinnacle of college football.
So what do these three athletes have in common, aside from being arguably the best players in their respective sports at the time?
They all arrived at LSU by transferring—a move that has become far more common in the current climate thanks to the NCAA transfer portal. Since its introduction in 2018, participation in the portal has been steadily building each year. The 2021-2022 transfer numbers were up by nearly 3,000 from the previous year, according to NPR.
And if the 2023 Tigers hope to follow in the title-winning footsteps of Reese, Skenes and Burrow this fall, they’ll need contributions from an abundance of transfer athletes Brian Kelly has brought to Baton Rouge.
Quarterback Jayden Daniels—who boasts the second-best Heisman odds heading into the season—transferred to LSU in 2022 and instantly made his mark.
“I know I can play at a high level,” Daniels tells 225. “LSU is a platform (where) I get to play in the best conference in college football against the best competition to prepare myself for the next level. With Coach Kelly coming in, I knew the resume that he had, and I just needed a chance to compete and help bring LSU back to the top team in the country: a powerhouse level.”
PORTAL PARTICULARS
Transferring schools isn’t anything new.
Athletes have always been able to leave one college for another, but until the transfer portal was adopted by the NCAA in the fall of 2018, the process to transfer schools was drastically different.
Under the “old way,” athletes had to request permission from their head coach to contact another school. These coaches either accepted the request or denied it, the latter leading to another multi-step appeals process from the student.
Today, the portal acts as a “notification-of-transfer” model. Athletes simply need to submit their name into the portal in order to be transfer eligible—no more permission requests or appeal processes required.
Further streamlining the process, in April 2021 the NCAA eliminated a rule requiring transfers in most major sports to sit out a year before competing at their new school.
This combination of policy changes has led to an influx of transfers across the country over the past few seasons, which players and coaches alike have used to their advantage.
Defensive lineman Mekhi Wingo, who transferred to LSU after one season at Missouri, thinks the new policies have made the whole system more fair and beneficial for the players.
“I think it’s a great thing for players to be able to go to a new school and be eligible ASAP,” Wingo tells 225. “Coaches (change schools) all the time. Things happen at other schools—you’re young when you make that decision to go to a school. Then you learn things about the school that you may not have known before you committed there. Just having that opportunity to get a second chance and really try to find the perfect fit for you, I think, is a great thing.”
It appears Wingo isn’t alone in his opinion. A total of 10,129 student athletes entered the portal in the 2021 cycle, increasing to 11,902 for 2022.
There are still some intricacies and nuances to the transfer process, but five years in, there are countless stories of how the more relaxed rules have simultaneously aided coaches in bolstering their roster—and helped student-athletes find a new home.
TIMELINE
The evolution of the transfer process
Pre-2018
Athletes had to request transfer permission from their head coach, who could approve or deny it. Students could fight denials through a multi-step appeals process from the student.
Fall 2018
NCAA introduces the new transfer portal, eliminating coach involvement.
April 2021
NCAA nixes a rule requiring transfers to sit out a year of eligibility at their new school.
2021-present
With the process now easier than ever, transfers across all sports and states explode. Transfers in 2021-22 were up year-over-year by nearly 3,000 student athletes.
FINDING YOUR FIT
Every transfer story is different.
There could be a multitude of reasons for an athlete to switch schools—to seek more playing time, to be closer to family or just to get a fresh start elsewhere.
For Daniels, the answer was simple: It was time for a rebrand.
“I just wanted to come here and rebrand myself on the biggest stage to showcase my talents,” says Daniels, who won the starting quarterback job in fall camp just a few months after his arrival last season.
“When I first got here, it was just (about) me knowing my role. I didn’t want to overstep my boundaries or get on people. I just wanted to learn the offense and soak in my time throughout practice so I could compete at the highest level and play here. Over time, I started earning the respect of the guys.”
Daniels’ approach paid off.
The former Arizona State athlete’s 3,798 yards of total offense in 2022 ranks No. 2 in single season LSU history. He wound up accumulating 2,913 yards through the air—the second-most in the past decade, behind only Burrow’s Heisman campaign—to go along with 885 rushing yards (the most of any quarterback in the country) and 28 total touchdowns.
If Daniels can put up those kinds of numbers his first year on a new team with a group of players, what can the future hold for the LSU signal-caller in Year Two?
“Now it’s kind of a different approach knowing that I’m the guy here,” Daniels says. “I know the guys can look at me and trust me, and they know I have their back. I want to help this team win. We just have to trust in the process we have set and keep holding each other accountable to meet the standards that we have in place. We’ve got to be elite and really dominate when we go out there.”
Despite Daniels’ later arrival in Baton Rouge, he quickly solidified himself as one of the leaders on the team.
“This is much more about veteran presence than acclimating to a new program,” Kelly said of Daniels during a spring press conference.
In fact, it’s a trend across the team: On the defensive, Major Burns is an experienced safety who initially committed to Georgia but transferred to LSU in 2021. The Baton Rouge native has since become a leader in the secondary and is poised for an even bigger impact in 2023.
And the same goes for Wingo. Even though he made the move from Missouri to LSU just a little more than a year ago, Wingo started 13 times last season. He is one of the first names mentioned when asked about team leaders.
“When I came in, the first thing I wanted to do was just gain the trust in the team,” says the St. Louis, Missouri, native. “It wasn’t just me wanting to assert myself as a leader or be a guy that talks loud in the room in front of coaches or anything like that. I just wanted to come in and show guys that I’m a hard worker and I’m going to do whatever is necessary for the team.”
Wingo was a standout freshman for Missouri in 2021, appearing in 11 games while starting three and eventually earning Freshman All-SEC honors.
Like Daniels, Wingo was earning playing time and starting to build a name for himself in his home state.
But when Wingo saw an opportunity to play for the best, with the best and against the best, he jumped at it.
“My initial decision was just looking for something different—just looking for a little more stability,” Wingo says. “This is a program with a rich history and (an opportunity) to play for a coach that has a history of winning and developing players. When it came down to it, I just felt like LSU was perfect for me. Coach Kelly, everywhere he’s been he’s won games and played good defense. I wanted to come here and be around other NFL-caliber guys and be able to compete with them day in, day out.”
The expectations for LSU this fall are now sky high, especially compared to last season where most media predictions had LSU sitting at somewhere between seven and nine wins.
Now, depending on where you look, LSU is projected as one of the top five teams in the country and a legitimate contender to reach the College Football Playoff.
And if the Tigers are hoping to keep that championship mentality alive and add some more hardware to the trophy case, they’ll likely have the transfer portal to thank.
New faces
A few of the many transfers to watch this season
Aaron Anderson
Wide receiver
Alabama → LSU
Jordan Jefferson
Defensive lineman
West Virginia → LSU
Paris Shand
Defensive lineman
Arizona → LSU
Bradyn Swinson
Defensive end
Oregon → LSU
Jalen Lee
Defensive tackle
Florida → LSU
Mason Lunsford
Offensive tackle
Maryland → LSU
Ovie Oghoufo
Defensive end
Texas → LSU
Omar Speights
Linebacker
Oregon State → LSU
Denver Harris
Cornerback
Texas A&M → LSU
Zy Alexander
Cornerback
Southeastern → LSU
JK Johnson
Cornerback
Ohio State → LSU
Duce Chestnut
Cornerback
Syracuse → LSU
Andre Sam
Safety
Tulane → LSU
Logan Diggs
Running back
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Notre Dame → LSU
This article was originally published in the August 2023 issue of 225 magazine.
Sources: NCAA data, NPR, 247 Sports, LSUSports.net