Florida Gators offer former offensive lineman Michael Tarquin

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Billy Napier and the Florida Gators moved quickly in the transfer portal on Saturday. Florida didn’t have to do much research when USC offensive tackle Michael Tarquin entered the transfer portal, Tarquin is a former Gator and started for this coaching staff.

The 6-foot-5, 300-pound lineman transferred to Southern California from Florida prior to the 2023 football season. He was slated to start at left tackle for the Trojans and spent spring ball there, was flipped back to right tackle (where he played at Florida) prior to fall camp.

Tarquin started the first seven games of the season at right tackle but the USC offensive line. With the change, Tarquin was removed in favor of fellow transfer Jarrett Kingston, who moved from right guard to right tackle. Tarquin saw just one snap against Utah and nine against Cal, then did not play against Washington or Oregon. He came back into the starting lineup against UCLA when Kingston missed the rivalry game due to injury.

Tarquin will leave USC as a grad transfer with one final year of eligibility remaining. He has reported offers from Auburn and Arizona State as well as Florida.

Michael Tarquin at Florida

A native of Ocala, Tarquin started eight games during the 2022 season. Tarquin suffered a foot injury during a win over Kentucky that kept him out of four games. When he returned to the field he started the final six games of the season, including the Las Vegas Bowl.

Tarquin played in 34 games for the Gators, making 10 starts.

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.