SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee and quarterbacks Preston Stone (2) and Kevin Jennings (7) lead the Mustangs onto the field before the first half of the ACC championship game against Clemson on Dec. 7 in Charlotte, N.C. (Elias Valverde II/The Dallas Morning News/TNS)

As SMU prepares to play Penn State on Saturday in the fake playoff, head coach Rhett Lashlee is trying to build a wall around his roster before the season is even over.

Rather than minimize, or duck, the topic, Lashlee owned all parts of the crash up derby that is the NCAA’s transfer portal. Not its existence. Its timing.

“Let’s call it like it is, people are bombarding our roster trying to pick people off our roster,” Lashlee said Tuesday morning after his team practiced on SMU’s campus. “We’re trying to focus on the playoff.

“I hate it; you get a chance to play in the college football playoff, yet you are either forced to decide, ‘Do I go in the portal?’”

How do you fix it?

“It’s real easy,” he said. “Don’t have a transfer period in December.”

Even those who have a deep affinity for ‘chaos theory’ would look at the current state of major NCAA football, and specifically its transfer policies, and say, “Jurassic Park was a better idea.”

Under intense pressure, the NCAA finally modified its draconian transfer policies and created its “transfer portal” in 2018. Amid a flowing river of lawsuits, the NCAA has since widened the portal to the point where it looks like Interstate 35 in Austin at 5 p.m. on a weekday.

Currently, the portal opens the day after the postseason field is set, and it closes on Dec. 28. In the spring, it will be open from April 16 to April 25. If a head coach leaves the program, the portal has a 30-day window for those players.

Like any solution, its created problems. The current issue is what will be a growing number of players who have no choice but to enter the portal despite the fact their team is in the new 12-team playoff. In this era, the “I” in NIL matters a lot more than the “I” that does not exist in “Team.”

SMU backup quarterback Preston Stone, who began the season as the starter, announced his intentions to transfer but will remain with the team through the end of its season. If starter Kevin Jennings can’t play, Stone is the guy.

Penn State backup quarterback Beau Pribula announced he is in the portal. He will not remain with the team.

University of Texas defensive lineman Sydir Mitchell is in the portal. He’s played in seven games total, in 2023 and ‘24 combined. Would he have played much for UT in these playoffs? Probably not.

Georgia is a favorite to win the national title, and reportedly seven of its players are in the transfer portal.

“It’s terrible. I feel so awful for our kids, and kids around the country,” Lashlee said. “We talk about making a system that is great for them, but we haven’t. That’s part of our jobs as adults is to make what’s best for young people, not what they want, necessarily.

“They don’t want this. Yes, they want the ability to transfer, and go where they want. They want the ability to make money on (NIL). None of those are bad things. There is no other sport at all that has free agency in season. It’s sad.”

The challenge remains those pesky classes. School continues to ruin everything.

Since most spring academic calendars start by the third week of January, the timing of the portal window allows for a player to navigate this glorified free agency so they have time to select a team … er, school. It’s enough time to allow that player to enroll in the spring semester.

It’s also right in the middle of college football’s postseason. Players bailing out of second- and third-tier bowl games no longer registers. Players quitting on a team that is in the playoffs is an indictment on the system.

The semifinals for this college football playoff are scheduled for Jan. 9 and Jan. 10. The University of Texas’ spring class schedule begins Jan. 13.

The college football national title game is 7:30 p.m., Jan. 20 in Atlanta. By that time, the University of Georgia will have been in class for two weeks.

Lashlee essentially proposed that the player is committed to the school for what amounts to two semesters; and that the portal window be open in the spring.

“The start of the scholastic year is in August, and it ends in May,” he said. “It’s not in December and January.”

He would get some push back on that.

“We need one portal window, and we need to look long and hard at what is best overall for the young people that it affects, and it’s supposed to benefit,” Lashlee said. “Because right now there are too many issues that don’t give them the true benefit they deserve.”

People may debate Lashlee on some of the fine print to his argument, but few would disagree with his overall assessment that the timing to this portal is indeed terrible.

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