The Tennessee Volunteers have been in the headlines lately due to their struggles in the transfer portal to secure a quarterback. The hearing of Vols QB Joey Aguilar’s lawsuit against the NCAA seeking an injunction to allow him to play next season was postponed indefinitely this week, leaving Tennessee in limbo.
Volunteers coach Josh Heupel also further saw his options for QBs dwindle as his top target, Sam Leavitt, who earned a PFSN’s CFB QB Impact Metric score of 79.7, committed to Lane Kiffin’s LSU Tigers.
Tennessee AD Blasts Cheating CFB Programs
During an appearance on “The Mike Keith Show” on Thursday, Tennessee athletic director Danny White blasted some of the NIL practices that college football teams employ while negotiating with players in the transfer portal.
“There are schools that don’t intend to submit (NIL deals) through the (NIL) clearinghouse, and I think that’s a low integrity move. It’s akin to paying players under the table in the old world,” White said. “If we’re going to have rules, then people need to follow them. And if they don’t, there needs to be penalties.
“We need enforcement and accountability if that (cheating) is happening, and I believe that it is. There are two sides to it: Are you planning on just cheating and never submitting it to the clearinghouse? If so, there needs to be penalties for that. Otherwise, why do we even have rules? We are going to follow the rules of engagement of the new settlement terms.”
The revenue-sharing rules came into effect on July 1, 2025, after the conclusion of the House vs. NCAA settlement, mandating schools to pay student-athletes under a $20.5 million cap. In addition, players can be paid by boosters and third-party NIL entities.
Under the rules overseen by the College Sports Commission, all NIL deals over $600 are subject to approval by a clearinghouse named NIL GO, and schools cannot guarantee certain payments during their negotiations with players in the transfer portal.
Tennessee Accused of Portal Tampering by CFB Insider
During an interview with On3 on Tuesday, Alabama Crimson Tide QB Ty Simpson revealed that the Volunteers offered him up to $4 million to forego the NFL Draft and return to college football in Knoxville.
During Thursday’s segment of the “Joel Klatt Show,” analyst Joel Klatt blasted the teams that tried to lure Simpson back to college football for tampering due to the fact that Simpson was not in the transfer portal when they made him the offers.
“How is he getting offers and he’s not in the transfer portal? Isn’t that tampering? It’s just so blatant at this point,” Klatt said. “He names them right there, so we know they made offers toward him? But don’t we know that this is prevalent? Don’t coaches complain about it all the time? And yet, the coaches get together and don’t say, ‘We’ll tackle tampering.’
The NIL era, coupled with revenue sharing and ever-changing transfer portal rules, has greatly altered the landscape of college sport, with schools struggling to cope with the new loopholes in the sport.
