FSU football: Top 5 transfer portal needs post 2023 season
FSU football completed the 2023 regular season undefeated, winning the ACC Championship for the first time since the 2014 season.
Of course, the Noles got snubbed from the College Football Playoff, but the FSU coaching staff had no time to rest on their laurels or throw pity parties.
It’s a crucial time of the year, with the Early Signing Period is only a couple of weeks away, and the transfer portal opened shortly after Mike Norvell hoisted the ACC trophy over his head.
That meant the fluidity of the transfer portal would be underway, with some FSU players leaving the roster to enter the portal while FSU coaches would look to fill some roster spots with impact players from the portal.
FSU has concentrated more on acquiring higher-quality players from the transfer ranks this recruiting cycle.
They won’t take quite as many portal players, but they’ll look to add impact guys like Braden Fiske, Fentrell Cypress, and Keon Coleman from the previous cycle.
Below are the top five areas they’ll likely look to add players from the transfer portal.
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Tiss the season for the transfer portal, and Florida football hosted a handful or targets on campus over the weekend.
The Gators welcomed a defensive back from Oregon on campus, hoping to bolster a woeful unit from the 2023 season.
Trikweze Bridges is a 6’3″ cornerback who saw about 20 snaps a game this season for the Oregon Ducks.
Bridges is the definition of a super senior. He originally enrolled at Oregon as part of the class of 2019. He was considered a mid-tier three-star prospect at the time.
He redshirted the 2019 season, saw minimal action during the 2020 campaign, and became a rotation guy in 2021.
Bridges saw extensive action during the 2022 season and had a solid campaign. Last season, he took a total of 704 snaps, was in pass coverage for 431 snaps, was targeted 50 times, and gave up 30 receptions.
Of the 94 cornerbacks in 2022 that had at least 400 snaps in coverage, Bridges was 24th best with the number of receptions he allowed.
But this year, Bridges saw his playing time drop, and he opted to use his bonus Covid year to explore the transfer portal.
He was on campus this weekend as part of a handful of players Billy Napier is trying to convince to come to Florida. And while Florida football doesn’t officially have a defensive backs coach announced, Los Angeles Chargers assistant defensive back coach Will Harris is rumored to be the guy coming to Gainesville.
Bridges is considered the 7th best cornerback in the country currently in the transfer portal
On3 currently gives Florida the best odds to land Bridges to their program.
If the Gators can unlock the version of Bridges we saw in 2022, Florida will add a solid cornerback with years of experience that can hopefully shore up some of the issues we saw this season.
