Report: Florida working to finalize visit with Jason Zandamela
GAINESVILLE, Fla — The Florida Gators haven’t made too many moves in the spring transfer portal window, but that could be about to change. On Monday On3’s Hayes Fawcett reported that the Gators are working on finalizing a visit with Southern California offensive lineman Jason Zandamela.
Fawcett reported that Zandamela will be in Orlando to visit UCF on Tuesday and Wednesday (April 23-24) and that a visit just up the road in Gainesville could be in the works as early as this weekend or the following week.
Zandamela has a unique background. A native of Mozambique, Africa, Zandamela, a former rugby player, had never even heard of football before coming to America in 2020. He was named to the 2023 USA Today Florida Network Preseason All-State Team and the 2023 MaxPreps Preseason All-American Second Team before his senior season at Clearwater Academy (Fla.).
The 6-foot-3, 305-pound offensive lineman was ranked as one of the top offensive linemen in the 2024 cycle, according to the On3 Industry Rankings, a proprietary algorithm that compiles ratings and rankings from all four primary recruiting media services.
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.
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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. 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.
