USC Football Roundup: NCAA ends transfer restrictions (6/13)

The NCAA ended restrictions on transfers while Trojan camp attendees made an impression. Here’s the USC football roundup for June 13.

Along with changing rules for redshirting, the NCAA announced a major adjustment to transfer rules, giving student-athletes the ability to transfer to another school without first asking for permission.

Coaches will no longer be able to block players from transferring as the NCAA set up a “notification-of-transfer” model wherein a student would inform their school of their intent to transfer, then be put into a national transfer database. From there, interested programs will be allowed to contact the player.

That’s a change from the old system which required players to first receive permission from their school to talk to other programs.

In a practical sense, this rule change won’t affect USC in any drastic way. The Trojans had already been fairly lax when it came to granting permission to student-athletes seeking to transfer. Just this spring, USC has seen offensive lineman Roy Hemsley and wide receiver Jalen Greene seek to continue their careers elsewhere. No restrictions were placed on those transfers.

When it comes to incoming transfers, the new rule would make it easier for the Trojans to seek out potential transfers should they desire reinforcements.

Camp impressions

There was a ton of activity on campus with the USC Elite Camp on Tuesday and Wednesday brought a bunch of analysis from the day.

USCFootball.com’s Gerard Martinez, Chris Trevino and Shotgun Spratling offered thoughts on the event’s top performers including linebacker Justin Flowe and Trojan commit Stanley Taufoou.

Gary Paskwietz of WeAreSC.com also penned observations on quarterback commit Kedon Slovis and many others from the camp.

Love for Clay Helton

NCAA football coach rankings haven’t always been kind to Clay Helton, who hasn’t quite broken free of the healthy skepticism that’s hovered over his tenure. But on Wednesday, Bill Bender of Sporting News gave Helton a pretty major endorsement when he ranked him 18th national and third in the Pac-12.

MORE: How does Clay Helton stack up against 2018 opponents?

Helton sits behind Chris Petersen and David Shaw, but beat out Chip Kelly by one spot. That’s pretty surprising considering Kelly’s achievements at Oregon, but Bender expresses some concern over a five-year layoff from the college game.

Reggie Bush gets paid

A jury in St. Louis ordered the Los Angeles Rams to pay Reggie Bush $12.45 million as compensation for an injury he suffered slipping on a concrete strip circling the field turf at the team’s former home.

Today’s Trojan Trivia

The USC record for punt return yards in a career is 1,025. Defensive back Johnny Williams set that mark in 1951 and it has stood for 67 years. Safety Mike Battle was 11 yards away from breaking it in 1968.