Texas A&M guard Andre Gordon enters NCAA transfer portal

Texas A&M guard Andre Gordon has entered the NCAA transfer portal, according to On3’s Jamie Shaw. The 6’2 senior spent four years with the Aggies but will now find a new home for his super senior season.

Gordon had an up-and-down career in College Station, arriving as a freshman for Buzz Williams’ inaugural season with the Aggies back in 2019-20. That year, Gordon was a fixture of the rotation and started 18 games for a team that didn’t make the NCAA Tournament, but did overachieve given expectations.

Then, as a sophomore in 2021, the team floundered as they dealt with COVID issues throughout the season, but Gordon again started 18 games, which was every game A&M played that season, and finished fourth on the team averaging 8.3 points a game.

The next couple of seasons weren’t as productive for Gordon. The program improved exponentially over the last two years, but that rise coincided with a big dip for Gordon statistically. He sacrificed numbers in 2022 but still started half the team’s games and was a key rotation piece. In 2023, though, he averaged just two points in 15 minutes played per game.

Now, the experienced guard and tenacious perimeter defender will look for a new home extremely late in the offseason, which should mean there are some desperate suitors likely to come after him.

To keep up with the latest players on the move, check out On3’s Transfer Portal wire.

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.