Report: South Carolina transfer Devin Carter receiving interest from big-name schools

Former South Carolina guard Devin Carter, who entered the transfer portal last week, has received interest from multiple big-name schools, according to CBS Sports’ Jon Rothstein. Among the biggest programs involved, SEC rivals Arkansas, Georgia, LSU and Mississippi State have all reached out.

A 6-foot-3, 188-pound guard, Carter has decided to enter the transfer portal following the firing of Frank Martin, who led the Gamecocks to a 18-13 season in 2021-22. South Carolina has since hired Lamont Paris to take over the program.

As for Devin Carter, he averaged 9.0 points, 3.8 rebounds and 1.8 assists per game on 42% shooting last season before entering the transfer portal and looking at other schools. His best game of his freshman season came in a win over Army on Dec. 22 as he scored 22 points on 8-of-13 shooting.

Other big programs which have reached out to Carter include Providence, Oregon, Arizona State, Kansas State, Nebraska, Oklahoma and UConn. Other schools involved, per Rothstein, are UNLV, Murray State, UCF, Memphis and UMass.

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.

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.