USC, Lincoln Riley land commitment from SEC transfer

Lincoln Riley has once again landed a highly-coveted player in the NCAA Transfer Portal, as former Auburn Tigers linebacker Romello Height announced on Saturday that he will be transferring to USC.

Height posted a video on Twitter with clips from former USC linebackers such as Brian Cushing, with a video at the end of him in USC gear standing in front of the LA Memorial Coliseum.

It’s up from here❗️ Cali lets go✌️❤️#Committed pic.twitter.com/O2hEdHk8Bv

— Thechosen1️⃣ (@height_romello) January 23, 2022

Height is the latest of nearly a dozen highly-rated transfers to flip over to USC. Others include former Oklahoma wide receiver Mario Williams, former Washington wide receiver Terrell Bynum, former Colorado wide receiver Brenden Rice, former Oklahoma cornerback Latrell McCutchin, former Colorado cornerback Mekhi Blackmon, former Virginia offensive tackle Bobby Haskins, former TCU EDGE Earl Barquet, former Kansas State defensive lineman Tyrone Taleni, former Oregon running back Travis Dye and former Stanford running back Austin Jones.

Height arrived at Auburn in 2020, appearing in just one game against LSU in the COVID-impacted season. In 2021, Height appeared in eight games but was hardly a top EDGE for Auburn’s defense. He finished the season with 18 tackles (six solo stops) in Bryan Harsin’s first year as Auburn’s head coach.

Height was a coveted NCAA Transfer Portal prospect despite not contributing too much at Auburn, and that was in large part due to his status as a recruit. A 6-foot-3, 214-pound linebacker from Dublin, Georgia, White was a four-star recruit out of Dublin High School via the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

Additionally, Height was the No. 37 linebacker in the 2020 recruiting class and No. 36 prospect in the state of Georgia.

For a full list of NCAA Transfer Portal entries, click here.

Transfer Portal background

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.