Texas A&M EDGE Donell Harris enters transfer portal

Texas A&M redshirt sophomore edge rusher Donell Harris has entered the transfer portal. Jimbo Fisher announced that the Florida native was forced to medically retire in fall camp, but was recently cleared to return to action.

The 6-foot-3, 220 pounder was an elite four-star recruit in the class of 2020 after reclassifying from the 2021 class. He was ranked as the No. 4 EDGE and No. 53 overall prospect in the nation. Harris, who is from Florida, chose Texas A&M over offers from Georgia, Alabama, Clemson, LSU, and others.

Harris played in two games as a true freshman in 2020, making his collegiate debut in the season-opening win over Vanderbilt. He tallied his first career tackle in the dominating 48-3 win at South Carolina. He redshirted the year. After that, Harris played in two more games in his second season with the Aggies, totaling four in his career.

He missed the entire 2022 season with the aforementioned injury, but had recently announced he had been cleared to return to action. Hailing out of South Florida, the former four-star recruit could look to return closer to home or join his brother, 2023 four-star cornerback Daniel Harris, who’s considering Penn State, Georgia, Ohio State, Michigan and more.

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.

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.