Intriguing UTEP receiver has entered the NCAA Transfer Portal

An interesting player entered the NCAA transfer portal on Tuesday.

UTEP wide receiver Jacob Cowing put his name in the portal, On3’s Matt Zenitz has learned. Cowing ranks seventh in the FBS with 1,367 receiving yards.

An interesting addition to the transfer portal:

UTEP standout wide receiver Jacob Cowing, who ranks seventh nationally with 1,354 receiving yards, has entered the portal, @on3sports has learned.

https://t.co/St4ensmRGU

— Matt Zenitz (@mzenitz) December 21, 2021

Cowing was a second team All-Conference USA nominee last season and had a breakout campaign this year. He had seven touchdowns in addition to the seventh-most receiving yards in the country as part of a strong UTEP offense.

Cowing was a three-star recruit out of Maricopa High School in Arizona and was the No. 60 recruit in Arizona from the class of 2019, according to the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

The Miners went 7-6 in the regular season to become bowl eligible. UTEP fell to Fresno State 31-24 in the New Mexico Bowl on Dec. 18.

Dear Miner Nation
I just want to start off by saying I appreciate the love and support from all the fans 🙏🏽 I want to say thank you to coach dimel and the coach staff for believing in me and pushing me hard everyday With that I’m entering the portal for my last two years🙏🏽‼️ pic.twitter.com/6t5w4ybTT2

— Jacob Cowing (@jaycowing_) December 21, 2021

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.