Former four-star quarterback Connor Neville transferring from Washington State

PULLMAN – Washington State will now take only five, not six, scholarship quarterbacks into the 2019 football season.

Redshirt sophomore QB Connor Neville, a former four-star high school prospect, announced Monday WSU had submitted his notification to transfer and entered his name into the NCAA’s transfer portal.

Transfers generally have to sit out one season before being permitted to play at their next school, but Neville, in a tweet announcing his transfer, said he’d be eligible to play immediately because WSU will grant him a “run off waiver.”

A “run off waiver” can be filed if a student-athlete can’t return to their previous institution for reasons out of their control, or “run off” by that institution.

It’s possible Neville was not granted an opportunity to return to Pullman for his redshirt sophomore season because of WSU’s growing scholarship count at the QB position. By signing three-star high school prospect Gunner Cruz and adding Eastern Washington grad transfer Gage Gubrud, the Cougars would’ve been carrying six scholarship QBs on their roster this fall.

Neville, who redshirted in 2017, didn’t take a rep at WSU last season and was considered to be behind at least four other QBs – Gubrud, redshirt seniors Trey Tinsley and Anthony Gordon, and redshirt freshman Cammon Cooper – on the Cougars’ depth chart.

The 6-2, 205-pound Neville was a four-star recruit according to ESPN coming out of Wilsonville High School in Beaverton, Oregon, and listed offers from Boise State and Hawaii. ESPN considered him the third-best recruit in the state of Oregon and the ninth-best dual-threat QB in the country.