{"id":768770,"date":"2026-07-17T18:39:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T18:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/768770\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T18:39:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T18:39:09","slug":"pitts-pat-narduzzi-says-miami-tried-to-lure-qb-mason-heintschel-into-transfer-portal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/768770\/","title":{"rendered":"Pitt\u2019s Pat Narduzzi says Miami tried to lure QB Mason Heintschel into transfer portal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi said Miami unsuccessfully tried to lure Panthers quarterback Mason Heintschel into transferring a few days before the January portal window closed.<\/p>\n

Heintschel took over as Pitt\u2019s starter four games into his freshman season and finished with 2,354 yards, 16 touchdown passes and eight interceptions. The three-star recruit out of Ohio went 6-2 as a starter in the regular season and agreed to a deal to stay with Pitt well before the portal opened on Jan. 2.<\/p>\n

The portal remained open through Friday, Jan. 16.<\/p>\n

\u201cMiami tried to get Mason Thursday before (the portal closed Friday), and we were able to hang on to him and shut them down,\u201d Narduzzi told The Athletic on Friday.<\/p>\n

Miami was working multiple quarterbacks at that time and landed on Duke quarterback Darian Mensah, who had already signed a deal to stay with the Blue Devils. Narduzzi said he called Duke coach Manny Diaz before it happened.<\/p>\n

\u201cShoot, I talked to Manny that Thursday afternoon and said, \u2018Hey, watch out. I hear he\u2019s going for your guy next.\u2019 And sure enough, they stole him,\u201d Narduzzi said.<\/p>\n

Miami did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Diaz and Duke never publicly went after Miami for tampering, but the school filed a lawsuit against Mensah that was settled for financial damages<\/a>. Mensah led Duke to an ACC championship last December.<\/p>\n

Heintschel said his agent and his family helped shield him from any schools that might have been interested in coaxing him into the portal as he established himself as one of the promising young quarterbacks in the Power 4.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy thought process is always just being where your feet are,\u201d Heintschel said. \u201cI think that\u2019s the biggest thing for me: I\u2019ve always wanted to be here. I think this is where I want to be for my career.\u201d<\/p>\n

Currently, any recruiting of another school\u2019s athlete would be an NCAA violation. Some in college sports believe the tampering rules are outdated and should be revised to match the current transfer rules, which allow players to move without restrictions every year.<\/p>\n

The NCAA\u2019s Division I Cabinet is in the early stages of discussing a concept to create a legal tampering period in November or December, where coaches or personnel staffers would be permitted to contact designated representatives of players on other teams.<\/p>\n

Narduzzi is not a fan of that idea.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey need to eliminate it,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just not right. I mean, would you want someone tampering with your wife before you get the divorce?\u201d<\/p>\n

The two-week period in January marked the only portal window this offseason. Narduzzi said eliminating the second spring portal window, which previously ran in April, was a necessary step in college football.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got less gray hair. I\u2019m not thinning out as much as I was prior to the two windows,\u201d Narduzzi said. \u201cOne portal window is great. I\u2019m all for our guys having opportunities to go where they want to go or where we want them to go. I think the portal is a two-way street. But one window is all you need. \u2026 Our team knows they can go out in spring ball and they\u2019re gonna be with their guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next year, the January window could shrink from 15 days to 10 if the NCAA oversight committee approves the change<\/a> this August.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we can go down to 10 days, it eliminates the tampering by five days,\u201d Narduzzi said. \u201cWhether it\u2019s your quarterback in the last five days getting tampered with or whatever it may be, I think it\u2019s bad stuff, and it needs to be eliminated. We\u2019re not gonna get rid of tampering tomorrow. But the fewer days, the less tampering there will be.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi said Miami unsuccessfully tried to lure Panthers quarterback Mason Heintschel into transferring a few…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":768771,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[1607,399,7186,398,396,397,8939,99],"class_list":["post-768770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-college-football","tag-football","tag-miami-hurricanes","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-pittsburgh-panthers","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=768770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/768771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=768770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=768770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=768770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}