NCAA Officially Passes Rule Granting Immediate Eligibility To Transfers
A historic NCAA decision is official.
The NCAA Division I Council formally passed a rule that allows one-time immediate eligibility for all transfers, it announced Thursday. The news was reported Wednesday afternoon by The Athletic.
“Allowing student-athletes a one-time opportunity to transfer and compete immediately provides a uniform, equitable and understandable approach that benefits all student-athletes,” said Council vice chair Jon Steinbrecher, chairman of the transfer working group and the Mid-American Conference commissioner. “The decision is consistent with Division I’s goal of modernizing its rules to prioritize student-athlete opportunity and choice.”
The adoption of the new legislation is a long-expected outcome of an initiative to adapt transfer rules. It started more than two years ago with the 2018 creation of the transfer portal and elimination of a requirement for transferring players to get permission from their schools to leave.
Football, men’s and women’s basketball, baseball and hockey were the only Division I sports that required undergraduate transfers to sit out a year before competing for their new school unless they were granted a special waiver.
The NCAA Board of Directors will meet April 28 to discuss ratifying the rule.
“If ratified by the board, the change is effective for student-athletes who have not transferred before and want to compete at a new school as early as this fall,” the NCAA’s announcement reads.
For this year, all athletes will need to submit a notification of transfer to their schools by July 1. Starting in 2022, the notification date moves to May 1 for fall and winter sport athletes and July 1 for spring athletes.
“The dates were selected based on a desire to balance providing flexibility for student-athletes to make informed transfer decisions with protecting the interests of students who don’t transfer but will be impacted by those who do,” the announcement says.
The rule also says the head coach of a transferring player’s new school and the player must prove no tampering took place between them before the player entered the portal. An old school cannot object to a player’s transfer destination. Players who transfer more than once or “do not meet the criteria” of the one-time transfer exemption can apply for a waiver.
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