Eleventh member of LSU's 2021-22 team, Mwani Wilkinson, enters NCAA transfer portal

It’s certainly going to be a new-look LSU men’s basketball team next season. Following the firing of former head coach Will Wade and the hiring of new head coach Matt McMahon, 11 different Tigers players have now entered their names into the NCAA Transfer Portal – with forward Mwani Wilkinson being the latest, per On3’s Matt Zenitz.

Wilkinson, who averaged 4.0 points and 3.0 rebounds per game as a sophomore for LSU in 2021-22, has made the decision to join 10 of his former teammates in the portal – which means there are now no remaining players from last season’s team on McMahon’s current roster.

Wilkinson joins Alex Fudge, Eric Gaines, Efton Reid, Shareef O’Neal, Jerrell Colbert, Bradley Ezewiro, Brandon Murray, Xavier Pinson, Adam Miller and Justice Williams in the NCAA Transfer Portal.

With LSU’s roster now wiped clean, it’s becoming more evident that McMahon will be bringing in transfers who played for him at Murray State to make-up his roster in Baton Rouge.

Transfer portal background information for LSU

The NCAA Transfer Portal, which covers every NCAA sport at the Division I, II and III levels, is a private database with names of student-athletes who wish to transfer. It is not accessible to the public.

The process of entering the portal is done through a school’s compliance office. Once a player provides written notification of an intent to transfer, the office enters the player’s name in the database and everything is off and running. The compliance office has 48 hours to comply with the player’s request and that request cannot be refused.

Once a player’s name shows up in the portal, other schools can contact the player. Players can change their minds at any point and withdraw from the portal. However, once a player enters the portal, the current scholarship no longer has to be honored. In other words, if a player enters the portal but decides to stay, the school is not obligated to provide a scholarship anymore.

The database is a normal database, sortable by a variety of topics, including (of course) sport and name. A player’s individual entry includes basic details such as contact info, whether the player was on scholarship and whether the player is transferring as a graduate student.

A player can ask that a “do not contact” tag be placed on the report. In those instances, the players don’t want to be  contacted by schools unless they’ve initiated the communication.

The portal has been around since Oct. 15, 2018 and the new calendar cycle within the portal begins each August. For example, the 2021-22 cycle started Aug. 1. During the 2020-21 cycle, 2,626 FBS football players entered the transfer portal (including walk-ons). That comes after 1,681 entered during the 2019-20 cycle and 1,709 during the abbreviated 2018-19 cycle. In comparison, 1,833 Division I basketball players entered the portal during the 2020-21 cycle after totals of 1,020 in 2019-20 and 1,063 in 2018-19.