Less than a week after announcing that he put his name into the NCAA transfer portal, Towson running back Shane Simpson joined Virginia as a graduate transfer.
Simpson, a first-team Football Championship Subdivision All-American in 2018, will have one year of eligibility for the Cavaliers and will be eligible immediately as a graduate transfer after completing his degree in sport management at Towson.
“WAHOO NATION LETS RIDE,” he tweeted on Sunday announcing his decision. He also received interest from Texas, Florida State, Northwestern, Penn State and Wake Forest.
Simpson told The Baltimore Sun last week that his decision to transfer from Towson was spurred by the Colonial Athletic Association’s announcement two weeks ago to suspend football in the fall. The league left open the possibility that the sport could resume in the spring and also gave member schools the freedom to pursue their own schedules, but the Tigers opted against that route.
“It all came down to once our season got canceled,” said Simpson, who missed most of the 2015 and 2019 seasons with injuries and was granted a sixth year of eligibility by the NCAA. “I didn’t want to leave because I was going to be a three-time captain, and being a captain means a lot to me. I wanted to finish the season with my brothers for the last time. But obviously due to the virus, that wasn’t going to happen. So it was either start training for the NFL or get some more film. So now that I’m healthy and I’m back, I chose to enter the portal.”
Simpson was named the 2018 CAA Special Teams Player of the Year after finishing second in all of FCS with 171.5 all-purpose yards per game. He finished his Tigers career with 1,925 career rushing yards and 13 touchdowns and recorded 5,088 career all-purpose yards, including 2,080 on kick returns.