Malik Zaire, one of the most coveted graduate transfers, will wait until after graduating from Notre Dame this weekend before deciding his move.
In recent years, the graduate transfer rule in college football has made the spring and summer months interesting as teams act like NFL franchises and try to convince players to “sign” with their school. The biggest name in this sweepstakes this summer appears to be the soon-to-be former Notre Dame quarterback Malik Zaire.
It’s been known for months that he will not be staying in South Bend after getting his degree — now, we know that he will at least be staying in northern Indiana for another weekend so he can get that piece of paper after a tweet from Rivals’ Texas writer Anwar Richardson:
Now, this is where things get interesting. Richardson’s tweet mentions two schools, with him obviously saying that the Longhorns are one of those. So, who is the second team? In the past, names like Wisconsin and even Harvard have been mentioned as landing spots. At the same time, another potential landing spot — the Florida Gators — was reportedly being removed by experts due to the timing Malik Zaire was expected to announce (today, before the SEC meetings).
However, NBC Sports’ College Football Talk speculates that the delay could put the Gators back into the running:
"SEC rules prohibiting players to be added to a football roster as a graduate transfer if that player previously failed to meet academic requirements after enrolling…If the SEC amends the rules in a way that would allow Florida to welcome Zaire without hassle, then the Gators could once again look like the favorites to add Zaire to the roster this fall."
While that is still a big IF, the Gators would be loving life if they are able to bring in Malik Zaire for even just one season. Since Urban Meyer left after the 2010 season, Florida has spent the last six seasons under both Will Muschamp and Jim McElwain with some dynamite defenses, while at the same time dealing with some of the worsts offenses in all of college football.
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The coming days or weeks will be interesting to see who wins the Zaire sweepstakes, and another display of the rent-a-player mentality that has taken over major college football disguised as a good thing since players are graduating to do so.