West Virginia guard Joe Toussaint plans to enter NCAA Transfer Portal

West Virginia point guard Joe Toussaint plans to enter the Transfer Portal, according to college hoops insider Jon Rothstein, joining Kerr Kriisa as WVU guards to hit the market. Toussaint split time as the Mountaineers’ lead guard alongside Kedrian Johnson in 2023 and was in line to play a similar role in his fifth season, but now will find a new home following the Bob Huggins resignation.

Here was Rothstein’s report:

“Source: West Virginia’s Joe Toussaint also plans to enter the transfer portal. Averaged 9.4 PPG last season.” Rothstein also added that Toussaint has graduated and will not require any sort of waiver to play next season at a new school.

Toussaint originally began his career at Iowa as a backup point guard but was never granted a premier role and eventually found a perfect home with West Virginia. In one year in Morgantown, he spiked as a scorer, doubling his previous average to score 9.4 points a game to go along with 2.6 assists and 2.8 rebounds. A steady veteran point guard just hit the portal and will be a terrific late-offseason addition for whoever gets 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.