Regardless of what happens anywhere this weekend in the Southeastern Conference, or next weekend for that matter, defending College Football Playoff champion Georgia is going to face SEC West resident LSU in Atlanta Dec. 3 for the league title.
It would be hard to present two more disparate pathways to the league's annual royal rumble inside the Atlanta Falcons' Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
Top-ranked and undefeated Georgia, as coach Kirby Smart noted this week, doesn't have a single starter on offense or defense via the NCAA Transfer Portal.
“I think that there is a lot of thought that [adding a large number of players through the Portal] is the way to success," Smart told reporters this week. "And it certainly can help you. But it can hurt you. It’s one way or the other. We’ve certainly tried to get kids out of there. We’ve tried to get a couple out of there, and we didn’t, but it’s getting the right ones. It’s not how many or any, it’s ‘Does the guy fit your culture?’.
“I am proud of the kids that stayed here, competed, and wanted to improve and get better -- because we had quite a few leave, too.”
Brian Kelly's first-year LSU squad has approximately 26 players on its roster who started their careers at different NCAA Division I -- Football Bowls Subdivision or Football Championship Subdivision -- programs, including starting quarterback Jayden Daniels from Arizona State, starting safety Major Burns from Georgia and punter Jay Bramblett, from Notre Dame, among others.
The Tigers, as Kelly pointed out this week on the SEC coaches' teleconference, also had less than half the allotted number of scholarship players on roster when they played their bowl game to end the 2021 season.
So Kelly doesn't want to make a Portal pipeline a necessary way of life at LSU.
"I can give you my philosophy as to how I think it can be managed; you can top the tank off but the base, most of you tank, has to be through player development," Kelly said of roster construction. "Through freshmen, developing your program, getting the right standards set, the culture of your program.
"Then you can bring in guys because they are going to assimilate to the culture that has been built. You don’t want the Transfer Portal and a number of those guys to set the culture, because they don’t know what it is. And it takes too long. To me, that’s where I think the Transfer Portal is great but I think you have to understand, it’s great if you top your tank off with it and fill in some needed positions but have the base of your program built through freshman recruiting."
Both Georgia and LSU have a player in a significant role who began his career at the other school; Arik Gilbert is part of the Bulldogs' talent-laden tight end group after starting his career at LSU under former Tigers coach Ed Orgeron.
Fifth-ranked Tennessee similarly has a cast of key contributors via the Portal, most notably Heisman Trophy candidate Hendon Hooker at quarterback and wideout Bru McCoy.
Arkansas coach Sam Pittman wants to keep constructing his roster primarily with high school players, but Pittman doesn't deny that the presence of the Portal -- and NCAA legislation changing to allow programs to get to an 85-man scholarship roster and not be constrained by merely a 25-scholarship cap in each class -- influence the Razorbacks' approach.
"My mind has (changed). I still want to get 20 or so high school kids. What’s probably changed more than anything is availability to get to 85 (scholarship players) instead of 25," Pittman said. "Whereas my mind before, I always want to recruit high school kids and get to 20 if I can, minimum, and then go to the Portal.
"Well, now, you could have 30 scholarships, 32 scholarships in a year, whatever it may be, and now your Transfer Portal (signees) will be more numbers. I still want to recruit high school, but because of the change in the 25 to 85 rule, I’ve changed my mind little bit more to what we can do to address some areas on the team we need to address, numbers-wise and talent-wise."
Kentucky coach Mark Stoops, who has built his program upon player development and then infused select Transfer Portal additions such as current starting quarterback Will Levis, said roster management has become a significant part of the season's grind.
“I think there’s no easy answers with some of this, but that is definitely a part of it and as we go through all the different tasks we have throughout the week in our preparation, roster management and dealing with it is certainly something that we have to discuss," Stoops said. "I think with having that last week after the regular season to have these discussions and get things in place, I think with probably each of us, I can’t speak for the other teams but certainly with us, you probably know certain people that you know that are clear-cut, that will be in the Portal and you have those discussions and you’re prepared for them.
"I think maybe different surprises or people that you don’t know, that gives you time to at least have a meeting and get organized for it before you get on the road in December and start your visits, because it’s always such a hectic time for all of us.”
Kelly's near-overhaul of the entire LSU program has afforded the Tigers the opportunity to lean on transfers, select members of its 2022 signing class and a core of veterans for its turnaround.
But the former record-setting Notre Dame coach cautions against overreliance of a roster constructed from players whose careers began elsewhere.
"I think you have to be very careful, because chemistry is still the one thing that can really upset a locker room and finding the right guys and making sure that they’re good teammates," Kelly said, "just because they’re great players doesn’t make them great teammates. You still have to have 11 guys who trust each other and are accountable to each other.
"Sometimes you can’t find that through watching film; you’ve got to get to know them. And you don’t get that opportunity through the Transfer Portal."
In other words, don't let the gas tank hit empty.