Kansas State may be able to land a home-state player in the transfer portal, if the visit in Manhattan goes well next week.
According to ESPN’s Pete Thamel, Florida State wide receiver Malik Benson is going to visit Kansas State and Texas A&M next week as he decides where he will wrap up his college football career.
Benson spent this past season at Florida State, but prior to that he was at Alabama, and before that played two years in Kansas at Hutchinson Community College.
Related: Transfer Portal Tracker: Incoming Big 12 Football Players for 2024-25
Coming out of Hutchinson Community College, Benson was ranked as the No. 1 JUCO prospect in the country, according to 247Sports, and picked Alabama over Tennessee and LSU. But the Lansing, Kansas native, who is 6’1” and 195 pounds, hasn’t lived up to the hype from the JUCO days.
At Alabama in 2023, Benson had 13 catches for 162 yards and one touchdown, and then at Florida State this past season, he finished with 25 catches for 311 yards and one score.
In his two seasons at Hutchinson, he had over 2,000 receiving yards on over 100 catches and 21 touchdowns. Coming out of high school, he was a standout track athlete running as low as the 10.4’s in the 100-meter dash.
Related: K-State Football in is Exclusive Blue Blood Company After Rate Bowl Win
The transfer portal officially opened on Monday, December 9, 2024, and will remain open until Saturday, December 28, with an exception for players on teams who play bowl games after the window closes. According to NCAA data, 2,273 FBS football players entered the transfer portal in 2023-24 school year, with 1,558 (68.5%) undergraduates and 715 (31.5%) graduate transfers. Of the entrants, 57% reported that they enrolled in another school, 8% withdrew their names from the portal, and 35% are still active, transferred to a non-NCAA school, or left their sport.
The Heartland College Sports Twitter account is an excellent resource for keeping up with the latest Big 12 news and announcements. Make sure you check out our HCS member forum to connect with other Big 12 sports fans.
