The popularity of the transfer portal has many college football programs allocating more scholarship spots and initial counters to transfers than ever before. Most programs, though, still sign many prospects out of high school. Texas State, however, took an interesting approach. At the conclusion of Wednesday’s National Signing Day, the school had signed 11 transfers and no high school recruits.

The transfers had all signed ahead of National Signing Day, with Texas State adding no new signees Wednesday. Head coach Jake Spavital told reporters that all 11 transfers will be available for the team’s spring practice starting March 2.

Texas State’s class led to some media speculation about whether Spavital is looking to use his current position as a stepping stone for another job. The 35-year-old former Texas A&M offensive coordinator became Texas State’s head coach in 2019.

According to Keff Ciardello of the Austin American-Statesman, Spavital said Texas State could add high school prospects when on-campus visits are allowed again by the NCAA. While Wednesday is officially National Signing Day, class of 2021 recruits have until Aug. 1 to sign. At this point, though, the vast majority of recruits have already signed, leaving coaches like Spavital a limited number of available prospects. There will probably be more players entering the transfer portal, though, as depth charts get sorted out in spring practice.

It will be interesting to see how the portal strategy works out for Spavital and the Texas State program.