Transfer Portal Re-Opens: Every QB EMU Played Last Year Has Hit the Portal
Transfer Portal Re-Opens: Every QB EMU Played Last Year Has Hit the Portal
Eastern Michigan added a pair of players in the trenches when the transfer portal re-opened Tuesday.
Austin Smith, the team’s starting quarterback in 2023 and some of 2022, made it to Austin Peay.
Ike Udengwu, who recorded two starts in his lone season at Eastern Michigan, hit the transfer portal after he made it through the spring with the team.
Cam’Ron McCoy, who didn’t practice with the team this spring but stayed on the baseball team, hit the portal this morning.
And just like that, every quarterback Eastern Michigan fielded in 2023 has now hit the transfer portal. The only face that’s still around is Jeremiah Salem, a walk-on from Tennessee who entering his fourth year with the program.
Unlike the winter and spring months that followed the 2021 season when then-starter Ben Bryant transferred back to Cincinnati and backup/former starter Preston Hutchinson transferred to UT-Chattanooga, EMU had already found potential answers for what the team’s going to do at the position immediately and what options it can have in the long-term.
EMU’s passing attack was ranked among the bottom of the country in just about every metric out there. As a team, EMU had a passer rating of 103.92, ranked #130 in the country, which is the lowest rating this team has seen since 2014 (team QBR of 106.52) when Chris Creighton was a first-year coach at Eastern.
EMU wanted its circumstances to change, so the quarterback overhaul was necessary. And now, the QB room has basically flushed out its old talent with new hopefuls.
That’s some of the highlights for EMU as the second opening of the transfer portal begun yesterday for this sport. While the QB situation is an obvious, EMU knows that this is a sport defined by how it blocks and how it tackles. While the opening of the window usually has more to do with the players being able to leave their schools to hit the market, EMU was able to add two graduate transfers at offensive tackle and a defensive end at the beginning of the second window as well.
With the additions of those two, EMU has now introduced 20 transfers through the portal, 21 if we include the walk-on kicker from Missouri.
Who’s leaving?
QB, Ike Udengwu III
QB, Cam’Ron McCoy
S, Cameron Smith
DE, Jaden Gaines
OT, Trenton VanBoening
Not only has EMU seen its QB room assemble a new cast of characters, but it’s also seeing one of its former defensive starters leave via portal this period. Cameron Smith was a two-year starting safety for the team before he was unrostered through the spring and now in the portal. For his career, he’s recorded 75 tackles (1 TFL), 1 interception, 5 pass breakups, and 1 forced fumble over 27 career games. A member of the 2021 signing class, Smith had the third-highest recruiting ranking (via 247sports composite) in the class.
The fourth-highest ranked player in EMU’s signing class, DE Jaden Gaines, has hit the portal as well. Gaines leaves with just six tackles recorded in his career; not a lot of playing time with 91 total snaps played last season (per Pro Football Focus).
Trenton VanBoening, who redshirted without seeing the field his first season at EMU, announced his decision to leave as well.
Who’s coming in?
P/K Daniel Hull (Missouri, as PWO)
OL, Logan Bednar (Harvard)
DE, Trey Laing (Indiana)
Kicking specialist Daniel Hull, who walked on with the local SEC team as a freshman last year, will transfer to EMU with the same walk-on status.
O-linean Logan Bednar is a rare recruit for Eastern Michigan? Not only is he a graduate transfer from Harvard, but he also comes from the HS football powerhouse St. John Bosco and was a senior for its 2019 national championship-winning team.
For defensive end Trey Laing, this will be his fifth college since his high school days (Godby HS, Tallahassee, Fla.) when he was an All-State player at the 7A high school level. Laing spent two years at USF (2018-2019), two years at East Mississippi C.C. (2020-2021), the 2022 season at FCS-level Southern, and the 2023 season at Indiana. However, at IU, Laing suffered a season-ending injury before the season began. At Southern, he recorded 14 TFL and 5 sacks over 12 games, and had 12.5 TFL with 6 sacks in 2021. Laing follows Casey Teegardin, the incoming defensive ends coach (and special teams coordinator) from Indiana.
