Former Ole Miss quarterback Austin Simmons has signed, committing to transfer to Missouri, according to On3’s Pete Nakos. As a sophomore last season, he has two years of collegiate eligibility remaining.

After losing his starting position in Oxford two games into this past season due to injury, Simmons will start anew in Columbia under Tigers head coach Eli Drinkwitz. Simmons finished the 2025 season completing 45-of-75 passes for 744 yards and four touchdowns.

Simmons opened the 2025 season as Ole Miss’ starting quarterback, leading the Rebels to wins over Georgia State and Kentucky with a combined 576 passing yards and three touchdowns. But an ankle injury in the fourth quarter against the Wildcats forced him to miss multiple games, which opened the door for former Division II Ferris State transfer Trinidad Chambliss to step in and establish himself as the Rebels’ QB1 with four straight victories, relegating Simmons to a backup role once he returned from injury.

Simmons has thrown for 1,026 yards and six touchdowns in 17 total games across two seasons in Oxford. He signed with Ole Miss as a four-star prospect in the 2023 recruiting cycle after reclassifying two full years having completed the prerequisite courses to graduate. The 6-foot-4, 215-pound Simmons was ranked as the No. 19 quarterback and No. 266 overall prospects in the 2023 class out of Moore Haven Junior/Senior High in Pahokee, Fla., according to the Rivals Industry Ranking.

After entering the transfer portal on Jan. 2, Simmons pledged to remain with the Rebels through their run in the College Football Playoff. While playing out the season might be atypical of transferring quarterbacks, Simmons may have already had a destination in mind given his “do-not-contact” tag in the portal, according to On3’s Pete Nakos.

Missouri has been considered the favorite to land Simmons since he entered, according to ESPN’s Pete Thamel. The Tigers are looking to replace 2025 starter  Beau Pribula, who announced his intentions to enter the portal last month after just one season in Columbia.

Despite losing his starting position, Simmons never lost the faith of now-former Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin, who left himself to take over at LSU ahead of the Rebels’ College Football Playoff run.

“I think we have the best quarterback room in the country,” Kiffin said Nov. 11. “I think Austin (Simmons) is a great quarterback, was playing really well for a first-time starter, and I think he’d be having a great year if he was still in there. I have all the confidence in the world in him. So I think we have two that are better than a lot of people’s No. 1.”

BERKELEY, Calif. — Cal quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele is a college football conundrum.

His debut for the Golden Bears in August defied traditional expectations for a true freshman. He was composed. He was accurate. He showcased his big arm and the physical attributes — at 6-foot-3, 225 pounds — that made him one of the most coveted high school quarterbacks in the 2025 class. For anyone who remembered Jared Goff’s debut in Berkeley over a decade earlier, the feeling was familiar. Here was a player for which college football would serve as a pit stop to the NFL.

In another era — like with Goff, not that long ago — Sagapolutele’s arrival would have translated into optimism about the future. If he was this good already, what will he look like as a junior or senior? How good will the team be once he develops?

Sagapolutele’s emergence, though, was processed differently. It was still natural to wonder about how he would progress, but it was accompanied with inevitable speculation: Can Cal keep him?

From the beginning, Sagapolutele said what Cal fans wanted to hear.

“This is where I want to be. I want to be at Berkeley. I want to be a Bear,” he told ESPN in September. “And going forward, I just hope everyone knows that. This is where I want to be. This is my home.”

As the season unfolded, the dips arrived. Turnovers. Missed reads. They were normal hiccups of a freshman quarterback learning on the fly. Meanwhile, Fernando Mendoza — Cal’s starting quarterback for most of the previous two seasons — had developed into a surefire first-round NFL draft pick and was on his way to winning the Heisman Trophy and leading Indiana to the top seed in the College Football Playoff.

Nothing in college football exists outside the quarterback transfer prism anymore. Every roster decision, coaching hire, NIL budget and depth-chart conversation is filtered through the same question: Who’s the quarterback, and how long do we actually have him?

EVEN BEFORE TRANSFER restrictions were lifted, quarterbacks always moved at higher rates than other positions. Only one is on the field, and without a clear path to playing time, players were willing to sit out a year — even losing a year of eligibility — just to try their shot elsewhere.

Now, with the ability to transfer and play immediately, things have been accelerated. When the transfer portal opened last week, there were more than 100 quarterbacks on the move. Done correctly, the portal offers a fast track out of offensive irrelevance. The safest formula has proved to be the least imaginative: bring the quarterback with the coach.

This past year, John Mateer went with his offensive coordinator, Ben Arbuckle, from Washington State to Oklahoma. Devon Dampier did the same at Utah, moving with offensive coordinator Jason Beck from New Mexico. And in both cases, it worked: Each helped guide their team to a 10-win season, a year after the Sooners and Utes finished with losing records.

They were hardly unique. Bo Nix transferred to Oregon to reunite with offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham, who coached him for a year at Auburn. Caleb Williams followed Lincoln Riley to USC and won the Heisman Trophy. Cam Ward thrived after moving with Eric Morris from Incarnate Word to Washington State. Dillon Gabriel reunited with Jeff Lebby, his former coordinator at UCF, when he transferred to Oklahoma.

When a player moves with a coach, it simplifies the evaluation. Michael Penix Jr. transferred to Washington to reunite with Kalen DeBoer, who had coached him as the offensive coordinator at Indiana. Ryan Grubb, UW’s then-offensive coordinator and the current OC at Alabama, said because Penix already spoke the language, the transition was easy.

“Michael was in our system in Indiana. You saw him running our stuff and it was like, ‘Oh wow he’s not only going to be able to come in and do the things that we believe he can do, but being able to understand the system — this is how we call this, this is going to go pretty quick,'” Grubb said.

It becomes harder to evaluate, Grubb said, if a quarterback had been operating in a completely different style of offense.

“If a player was running Tennessee’s offense and then trying to come in and run ours — and Tennessee’s a really good offense. But it’s like if they’re trying to run our system, is that going to translate?” he said. “Just two really, really different systems, where I don’t know if this guy’s already been there for a couple years and he’s entrenched, it’s going to take a little bit of time.

“And if you’re saying this guy’s coming here to be your starter, you better be pretty certain that he has the capabilities mentally to run your system.”

Penix’s familiarity translated directly to production. At Washington, Penix threw for 4,641 yards and 31 touchdowns in 2022, then followed it with 4,903 yards and 36 touchdowns in 2023, turning the Huskies into a national contender almost overnight. Over two seasons, Washington went 25-3, reached the College Football Playoff National Championship game, and Penix finished as a Heisman Trophy finalist before being selected No. 8 in the 2024 NFL draft. Since the portal opened, multiple teams are following a similar path.

Rocco Becht has said he plans to reunite with Matt Campbell after Campbell’s move from Iowa State to Penn State. Drew Mestemaker announced he would follow Eric Morris from North Texas to Oklahoma State. And AJ Hill committed to Arkansas, following new Razorbacks coach Ryan Silverfield from Memphis. The logic is the same: minimize uncertainty and shorten the time between arrival and impact.

Texas hasn’t used that model, but offensive coordinator Kyle Flood sees the logic.

“I think if you asked any college coach, they would tell you, in a perfect world, you would love to recruit your own players, retain them and develop them over three, four, five years, whatever that looks like,” Flood said. “But kind of like what I said before, that is not college football anymore. It is not.

“I think the art of recruiting is really the art of evaluation. It is not evaluating if he is a good player or not. That is not really the evaluation. The evaluation is does he have the traits to really excel at a high level in your system.

“Meeting them now, when they are in the portal, is not like meeting them in high school. It is really like your NFL top-30 visits where you say, ‘Hey, I have to get this guy in a room and I have to find out does this guy want to be coached, does he believe in the things that we believe in, how great does this player really, really want to be.'”

DESPITE SAGAPOLUTELE’S CONSTANT refrain throughout the season that he wanted to remain in Berkeley, there is only so much trust that can be placed in that sort of talk.

After all, Sagapolutele had committed to Cal, flipped to Oregon, enrolled, spent time on campus in Eugene and then reversed course again to land in Berkeley. That’s all to say, circumstances change.

As the season wore on, the skepticism about his future never fully disappeared, and when coach Justin Wilcox was fired, it was again front and center.

As general manager Ron Rivera began Cal’s coaching search, the quarterback position was part of the discussion from the start. Rivera relayed to candidates he felt strongly they would be able to retain Sagapolutele and laid out the plan to do so. There were no guarantees offered. Rivera described a process that mirrored free agency as much as recruiting.

The pitch wasn’t just about retaining one player.

“With a guy like that, people are going to want to come play for him and play with him, be a receiver, be a tight end, be a running back, be an offensive lineman,” Rivera said. “Why? Because not only are the scouts going to come watch him, but they’re going to see the other people around him.”

After Tosh Lupoi was hired, the urgency turned concrete. One of Lupoi’s first moves was to board a commercial flight to Hawai’i, where Sagapolutele was home on a brief visit. Lupoi met him face-to-face and quickly secured his commitment to stay.

Keeping Sagapolutele in place had a cascading effect. Retention became easier. Recruiting did, too. Receivers and skill players want to know who’s throwing the ball. Stability at quarterback, even if temporary, creates momentum.

But nothing about it is permanent. These are battles won a year at a time now. If Sagapolutele takes the expected step forward next season, the speculation will return just as quickly. That isn’t a judgment on him or on Cal. It’s simply the reality of modern college football.

BERKELEY, Calif. — Calquarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele is a college football conundrum.

His debut for the Golden Bears in August defied traditional expectations for a true freshman. He was composed. He was accurate. He showcased his big arm and the physical attributes — at 6-foot-3, 225 pounds — that made him one of the most coveted high school quarterbacks in the 2025 class. For anyone who rememberedJared Goff’sdebut in Berkeley over a decade earlier, the feeling was familiar. Here was a player for which college football would serve as a pit stop to the NFL.

In another era — like with Goff, not that long ago — Sagapolutele’s arrival would have translated into optimism about the future. If he was this good already, what will he look like as a junior or senior? How good will the team be once he develops?

Sagapolutele’s emergence, though, was processed differently. It was still natural to wonder about how he would progress, but it was accompanied with inevitable speculation: Can Cal keep him?

From the beginning, Sagapolutele said what Cal fans wanted to hear.

“This is where I want to be. I want to be at Berkeley. I want to be a Bear,” he told ESPN in September. “And going forward, I just hope everyone knows that. This is where I want to be. This is my home.”

As the season unfolded, the dips arrived. Turnovers. Missed reads. They were normal hiccups of a freshman quarterback learning on the fly. Meanwhile, Fernando Mendoza — Cal’s starting quarterback for most of the previous two seasons — had developed into a surefire first-round NFL draft pick and was on his way to winning the Heisman Trophy and leading Indianato the top seed in the College Football Playoff.

Nothing in college football exists outside the quarterback transfer prism anymore. Every roster decision, coaching hire, NIL budget and depth-chart conversation is filtered through the same question: Who’s the quarterback, and how long do we actually have him?

EVEN BEFORE TRANSFER restrictions were lifted, quarterbacks always moved at higher rates than other positions. Only one is on the field, and without a clear path to playing time, players were willing to sit out a year — even losing a year of eligibility — just to try their shot elsewhere.

Now, with the ability to transfer and play immediately, things have been accelerated. When the transfer portal opened last week, there were more than 100 quarterbacks on the move. Done correctly, the portal offers a fast track out of offensive irrelevance. The safest formula has proved to be the least imaginative: bring the quarterback with the coach.

This past year, John Mateer went with his offensive coordinator, Ben Arbuckle, from Washington Stateto Oklahoma. Devon Dampier did the same at Utah, moving with offensive coordinator Jason Beck from New Mexico. And in both cases, it worked: Each helped guide their team to a 10-win season, a year after the Sooners and Utes finished with losing records.

They were hardly unique.Bo Nix transferred to Oregon to reunite with offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham, who coached him for a year atAuburn. Caleb Williams followed Lincoln Riley toUSCand won the Heisman Trophy. Cam Ward thrived after moving with Eric Morris fromIncarnate Wordto Washington State. Dillon Gabriel reunited with Jeff Lebby, his former coordinator atUCF, when he transferred to Oklahoma.

When a player moves with a coach, it simplifies the evaluation.Michael Penix Jr. transferred toWashingtonto reunite with Kalen DeBoer, who had coached him as the offensive coordinator at Indiana. Ryan Grubb, UW’s then-offensive coordinator and the current OC atAlabama, said because Penix already spoke the language, the transition was easy.

“Michael was in our system in Indiana. You saw him running our stuff and it was like, ‘Oh wow he’s not only going to be able to come in and do the things that we believe he can do, but being able to understand the system — this is how we call this, this is going to go pretty quick,'” Grubb said.

It becomes harder to evaluate, Grubb said, if a quarterback had been operating in a completely different style of offense.

“If a player was runningTennessee’s offense and then trying to come in and run ours — and Tennessee’s a really good offense. But it’s like if they’re trying to run our system, is that going to translate?” he said. “Just two really, really different systems, where I don’t know if this guy’s already been there for a couple years and he’s entrenched, it’s going to take a little bit of time.

“And if you’re saying this guy’s coming here to be your starter, you better be pretty certain that he has the capabilities mentally to run your system.”

Penix’s familiarity translated directly to production. At Washington, Penix threw for 4,641 yards and 31 touchdowns in 2022, then followed it with 4,903 yards and 36 touchdowns in 2023, turning the Huskies into a national contender almost overnight. Over two seasons, Washington went 25-3, reached the College Football Playoff National Championship game, and Penix finished as a Heisman Trophy finalist before being selected No. 8 in the 2024 NFL draft. Since the portal opened, multiple teams are following a similar path.

Rocco Becht has said he plans to reunite with Matt Campbell after Campbell’s move from Iowa Stateto Penn State. Drew Mestemaker announced he would follow Eric Morris from North Texasto Oklahoma State. And AJ Hillcommitted to Arkansas, following new Razorbacks coach Ryan Silverfield fromMemphis. The logic is the same: minimize uncertainty and shorten the time between arrival and impact.

Texashasn’t used that model, but offensive coordinator Kyle Flood sees the logic.

“I think if you asked any college coach, they would tell you, in a perfect world, you would love to recruit your own players, retain them and develop them over three, four, five years, whatever that looks like,” Flood said. “But kind of like what I said before, that is not college football anymore. It is not.

“I think the art of recruiting is really the art of evaluation. It is not evaluating if he is a good player or not. That is not really the evaluation. The evaluation is does he have the traits to really excel at a high level in your system.

“Meeting them now, when they are in the portal, is not like meeting them in high school. It is really like your NFL top-30 visits where you say, ‘Hey, I have to get this guy in a room and I have to find out does this guy want to be coached, does he believe in the things that we believe in, how great does this player really, really want to be.'”

DESPITE SAGAPOLUTELE’S CONSTANT refrain throughout the season that he wanted to remain in Berkeley, there is only so much trust that can be placed in that sort of talk.

After all, Sagapolutele had committed to Cal, flipped to Oregon, enrolled, spent time on campus in Eugene and then reversed course again to land in Berkeley. That’s all to say, circumstances change.

As the season wore on, the skepticism about his future never fully disappeared, and when coach Justin Wilcox was fired, it was again front and center.

As general manager Ron Rivera began Cal’s coaching search, the quarterback position was part of the discussion from the start. Rivera relayed to candidates he felt strongly they would be able to retain Sagapolutele and laid out the plan to do so. There were no guarantees offered. Rivera described a process that mirrored free agency as much as recruiting.

The pitch wasn’t just about retaining one player.

“With a guy like that, people are going to want to come play for him and play with him, be a receiver, be a tight end, be a running back, be an offensive lineman,” Rivera said. “Why? Because not only are the scouts going to come watch him, but they’re going to see the other people around him.”

After Tosh Lupoi was hired, the urgency turned concrete. One of Lupoi’s first moves was to board a commercial flight to Hawai’i, where Sagapolutele was home on a brief visit. Lupoi met him face-to-face and quickly secured his commitment to stay.

Keeping Sagapolutele in place had a cascading effect. Retention became easier. Recruiting did, too. Receivers and skill players want to know who’s throwing the ball. Stability at quarterback, even if temporary, creates momentum.

But nothing about it is permanent. These are battles won a year at a time now. If Sagapolutele takes the expected step forward next season, the speculation will return just as quickly. That isn’t a judgment on him or on Cal. It’s simply the reality of modern college football.br/]

Colorado’s rebuild is full tilt under Deion Sanders, who enjoyed the confidence of outgoing athletic director Rick George amid the most important two-week stretch of his coaching career with the Buffaloes. 

During this singular transfer portal window, Sanders will try and piece together a two-deep of newcomers that sparks on-field change in 2026 ahead of spring practice and a positive leap forward after a disappointing campaign.

With minimal returning starters from a 3-9 team, this is the Buffaloes’ opportunity to hit the reset button. It comes with considerable pressure after several personnel department and coaching staff changes followed the program’s second tumultuous stretch in three years. Colorado only signed a dozen players in its 2026 recruiting class from the prep ranks, a group slotted outside the top-50 nationally per 247Sports’ rankings.

The Buffaloes are only expected to add two more current verbal commits in February, so this roster overhaul will be portal-driven next season. 

“Punter Damon Greaves is committed to returning to Boulder as a senior, but otherwise there are needs across the roster, at every position group,” BuffStampede insider Adam Munsterteiger told CBS Sports. “Even the quarterback room, with a solid young (starter) in Julian Lewis, needs multiple additions following the graduation of Kaidon Salter and the decision from Ryan Staub to hit the portal. There is some solid skill and offensive line talent in the program to build around and add to.”

Personnel changes at Colorado

Colorado’s newly-promoted director of player personnel, Darrius Darden-Box, has his hands full with talent assessment and evaluations after the exit of Corey Phillips to Memphis. Phillips was the primary driver behind Sanders’ first three portal classes at Colorado along with the Buffaloes’ signings of Lewis, cornerback Cormani McClain and five-star offensive tackle Jordan Seaton. 

Promoted internally by Sanders, Darden-Box faces an exodus of contributors like all others on Colorado’s staff, with the most notable defections to the portal as of Jan. 3 to include safety Tawfiq Byard, edge rushers London Merritt and Alex McPherson, wideout Omarion Miller, defensive tackle Brandon Davis-Swain and offensive playmaker Dre’lon Miller. 

More than two dozen Colorado players have left the program since the Buffaloes’ season-ending loss to Utah.

“The thing about these guys man, you’ve got to understand when a guy leaves a program that selected him or picked him out of the portal, he leaves for a multitude of reasons,” Sanders said after that game on expected roster changes. “The No. 1 reason people leave is money. It’s not a disdain for staff or a disdain for player, it’s money. Let’s just be honest man and stop sugar-coating this foolishness. That’s why most people leave. 

“I admire the guys that want to go for another opportunity or bigger opportunity and play for a national championship … I applaud that, but that’s not the No. 1 reason people leave programs.”

Much like Jeff Brohm’s recruiting philosophy at Louisville and what Lane Kiffin previously spearheaded at Ole Miss before leaving for LSU, Sanders’ transfer-first mindset has featured 128 total transfer signings over the last three cycles — the most in college football.

Sanders landed the top-ranked transfer class in 2023 ahead of his first season with the Buffaloes and finished inside the top-20 each of the past two cycles. For 2026, Sanders has an uphill climb with more than two-dozen expected signings based on the number of scholarships now available.

Sanders’ transfer portal hauls at Colorado

Making new pieces fit, at least on offense, will be the job of new play-caller Brennan Marion. Sacramento State’s head coach last season, Marion brings his “Go-Go” scheme to the Buffaloes after Pat Shurmur was stripped of play-calling duties in November given third-down struggles and seemingly abandoning the run game.

Marion’s system is tempo-based, heavy on running the football and utilizes a two-back look most of the time. All of those factors should benefit Lewis in his continued development after he made couple starts during the final month of the season.

Sanders called Marion a “creative, innovative and knowledgeable” addition to his staff. His rushing offense at Sacramento State last fall was the second-best in FCS and the plan’s not changing with the Buffaloes.

Defensive portal focus

While both sides of the football command improvement, Colorado’s defense was taken to task against Big 12 competition this season, giving up 425.7 yard per game, which ranked last in the conference. One of the program’s first offers after the portal opened on Friday was Mercer edge rusher Andrew Zock, an FCS All-American who registered 21.5 sacks this season.

Zock was identified as an immediate need, along with a number of other Group of Five difference-makers on defense, including Bowling Green linebacker Gideon Lampron, James Madison cornerback Justin Eaglin, Tulane edge Jordan Norman and Louisiana Tech defensive back Michael Richard.

The Buffaloes have offered each of those defenders in addition to defensive linemen Dylan Manuel and Ezra Christensen from Appalachian State and New Mexico, respectively, in the early going.

“Defensively, there are needs across the board,” Munsterteiger said. “There are no returning defensive tackles, Colorado’s top five edge players are all gone and there is only one scholarship linebacker back from 2025. The Buffaloes are even going to have to revamp their cornerbacks room in the coming days and weeks.”

Carter Stoutmire, who was primarily used at safety, is the only returning player from last season’s regulars at cornerback after the loss of two-year starter DJ McKinney to the portal. The safety room is barren, too. Over the weekend, Colorado hosted New Mexico State safety Naeten Mitchell, who recorded 100 tackles and three interceptions this season.

Defensive line is another obvious position group of need after Colorado gave up 222.5 yards rushing per game last season, second-worst in FBS. The Buffaloes have reportedly reached out to several players up front in the portal.

The portal’s two-week window closes on Jan. 16, which always coincides with the final day student-athletes can enroll at Colorado for the spring semester.

Sanders was asked about the Buffaloes “resources” relating to player retention and portal signings after the season, but refused those limitations as an excuse in college football’s portal arms race in the NIL and revenue-sharing era. However, he did say changes were coming in “both” areas as it relates to staff and funding efforts.

“Yeah, it helps with a bag (of money), but it helps with having the right personnel on the sidelines as well as playing the game,” Sanders said. 

Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Sorsby was the hottest player in the transfer portal from the outset, though the race to sign him ended up coming down to the Red Raiders and LSU.

He met with both schools, though he chose the team that was the odds-on favorite at the outset — inking a reported $5 million NIL deal with Texas Tech to be their starting quarterback for one season.

More news: Alabama Loses Five-Star Defender to Transfer Portal After Rose Bowl Loss

His new deal is one of the biggest in the NIL era thus far, rivaling some of the top earners in college football. Sorby was contemplating entering the NFL Draft, but he decided it was better to stay in college for another year, potentially raise his draft stock, and make more money than he would as a Day 2 pick.

In fact, he is making more in one year of college ball than Sanders will make through his rookie NFL deal with the Cleveland Browns.

Sanders is set to make $4.6 million across his rookie deal over the four years, paling in comparison to the college senior’s payday.

Now, the Browns QB was a fifth-round pick in the 2025 draft, meaning that Sorsby, who was graded as a Day 2, would have eclipsed that number in total, though he would not have reached the yearly sum that he is getting.

More news: Florida State Gets DJ Lagway Update As Seminoles Look For Starting QB

Texas Tech is going all-in on the upcoming season, investing millions in football’s premier position and targeting other big-money transfers.

In 2025, the Red Raiders signed multiple players in the portal for over $7 million, including defensive linemen David Bailey, Romello Height, Lee Hunter, Skyler Gill-Howard, and A.J. Holmes Jr.

The defensive front was elite all year, and it was not the reason they lost to Oregon in the Orange Bowl. Their quarterback play led to their downfall, and they are hoping Sorsby can help lead them to a National Championship.

If he does, Sorsby will be well worth the massive investment.

More news: Top Transfer QB Brendan Sorsby Signs With Texas Tech as LSU Misses Out

For more college football news, head to Newsweek Sports.

What I really like