Miami wide receiver enters transfer portal

Miami wide receiver Dee Wiggins has entered the transfer portal, per On3’s Matt Zenitz.

The 6-foot-3, 195-pound redshirt junior recorded an underwhelming four receptions for 25 yards in two games this season. In total over four seasons, Wiggins played in 27 games and had 62 receptions for 791 yards and seven touchdowns. 

Last week, head coach Manny Diaz suggested that Wiggins may be looking to finish his collegiate career elsewhere as young wide receivers have dominated playing time for the Hurricanes. Xavier Restrepo and Keyshawn Smith have largely taken the place of both Wiggins and fellow receiver Mark Pope. There are several additional true freshmen in the pipeline that have shown promise for future seasons.

Additionally, the transfer of Charleston Rambo from Oklahoma most certainly impacted the playing time of the receivers already in Miami. He is Miami’s leading receiver. 

Wiggins is a Miami native out of Miami Southridge Senior High School.

Transfer portal background information

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.