Wisconsin wide receiver Stephen Bracey announces he's entering transfer portal

Stephen Samraby:Steve Samra10/17/22

SamraSource

Wisconsin is losing part of their receiving corps to the transfer portal, as Stephen Bracey took to Twitter on Monday to reveal he’s leaving the program.

Bracey, a member of the Class of 2019, will be looking for more opportunities moving forward, as he hasn’t received the playing time he expected when he first brought his talents to Wisconsin. While he thanked Wisconsin for providing him the chance to play college football, it’s evident Bracey believes it’s best to move on from the Badgers.

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“First off I would like to thank God and everyone in the Wisconsin football program for providing me the opportunity to play and create countless friendships and memories,” wrote Bracey. “With that being said my family and I have decided to officially enter my name in the transfer portal and continue my academic and athletic career elsewhere.”

Moreover, Bracey was a three-star recruit out of Grand Rapids, Michigan, according to the On3 Consensus. He was the No. 31 recruit out of his home state, and the No. 146 wide receiver and No. 1106 overall recruit in his cycle.

Check out the full On3 Transfer Portal Rankings.

More on Stephen Bracey, Transfer Portal

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.