Jeff Capel, Jim Boeheim support allowing transfers to play immediately

Jeff Capel said allowing student-athletes to transfer without having to sit out a season is the right thing to do, but he cautioned Monday that the proposal is “something that we (college coaches) are going to have to figure out how to navigate.”

The NCAA said recently that a rule change is under consideration that would allow undergraduate student-athletes in all sports to transfer once without sitting out of competition for one year. The ACC and Big Ten already have put their support behind the concept.

“It sounds like it’s going to happen,” Pitt’s basketball coach said. “I’ve always been a guy, even when I played, it should be even for everyone. Everything should be the same. A student-athlete is still a student, so the rules should be the same as it is for other students.

“I think it’s right.”

At the same time, Capel warns, “You hope, morally, you do the right thing. You’re not recruiting someone from someone else’s team. It could be difficult because I think that goes on right now to a certain extent.

“There will be an adjustment, for sure. As high as the transfer rates are right now, I think you’re going to see them go even higher.”

Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim previously had not supported allowing transfers to play immediately, but he said he has changed his mind.

“I’ve always been against it because I think it will create more guys leaving than we’ve ever seen,” he said.

“But because of the way the waivers have been handled — some guys get it, some guys don’t — I think I’m in favor of it just to clarify it. So, we don’t have some being able to leave, some not … when there’s almost no rhyme or reason, I think, in some cases. It will probably hurt the smaller schools a little bit more because, I think, their best player might think, ‘Geez, I’ll leave now.’

“But, overall, I think it’s better than the system we have right now. Everybody will adjust to it.”

The NCAA Board of Governors must approve the proposal, but it has placed a moratorium on changes to transfer legislation for the 2019-20 academic year. If the new legislation is adopted, the earliest it could take place would be for the 2021 football season and 2021-22 basketball season.