ACC transfer portal receiver coming home to play for South Carolina
More than three years after he left the Palmetto State, Ahmari Huggins-Bruce is headed back to South Carolina. The former Dillon High standout and Louisville transfer committed to the Gamecocks on Thursday.
In his three seasons with Louisville, the 5-foot-11, 170-pound pass catcher hauled in 80 passes for over 1,100 yards and 10 touchdowns. He finished as the Cardinals’ fourth-most productive receiver, but Louisville in recent weeks added a pair of wideouts from the transfer portal.
Huggins-Bruce announced he was leaving last Friday, just two days after Louisville’s season ended with a 42-28 loss to Southern California in the Holiday Bowl.
He is a much-needed reinforcement for a South Carolina wide receiver corps that lost its top two wide receivers (Xavier Legette and Ahmarean Brown) to the NFL Draft and saw another quintet (Juice Wells, O’Mega Blake, Landon Samson, Zavier Short and Kylic Horton) hit the transfer portal.
Huggins-Bruce is the second transfer receiver to sign with South Carolina, joining Jared Brown from Coastal Carolina. The Gamecocks had a commitment from Vanderbilt transfer WR Jayden McGowan, but he flipped to Boston College during the early signing period.
There were other options for Huggins-Bruce. According to Gamecock Central, he also had offers from Southern California, UCF, Tulane and others but visited Columbia on Wednesday and Thursday before pledging to the Gamecocks.
The Louisville transfer will enroll at South Carolina with one year of eligibility remaining. It will be a homecoming for Huggins-Bruce, who had 34 offers out of Dillon High School but was not offered by the state school just 100 miles away.
Now, three years later under a new head coach in Shane Beamer, Huggins-Bruce will become a Gamecock.
South Carolina gets more portal commitments
The Gamecocks got two other public commitments Thursday from transfer portal players:
▪ Charlotte transfer linebacker Demetrius Knight will transfer to South Carolina as a redshirt senior. Knight began his college career at Georgia Tech, playing in 36 games over four years before he moved on to Charlotte last season. In the Queen City, Knight led the 49ers in tackles (96) while notching 5.5 TFLs and a trio of interceptions.
The addition is a major boost to South Carolina’s linebacker room after the Gamecocks lost starter Stone Blanton and highly-touted freshman Grayson “Pup” Howard to the transfer portal.
▪ North Carolina Central transfer Torricelli Simpkins III committed to South Carolina. The 6-foot-5, 320-pound Charlotte native will join the Gamecocks with just one year of eligibility remaining.
What we learned last season — when the Gamecocks snagged Yale transfer OL Nick Gargiulo and Sidney Fugar from Western Illinois — is that USC values experience with transfer portal linemen. The Gamecocks are picky. They want someone who can contribute right away.
Simpkins seems to fit that bill. In three seasons at North Carolina Central, he started all 34 games for the Eagles and was named the MEAC’s Offensive Lineman of the Year after his junior season.
Gamecocks lose a commitment
Ball State transfer Brady Hunt, who committed to South Carolina in mid-December and was announced as part of the Gamecocks’ signing class, has flipped to Texas A&M, according to reports from Gamecock Central and TheBigSpur.
Because Hunt is a transfer, he didn’t have to sign a national letter of intent with USC but, rather, just a financial aid agreement. And, unlike an NLI, financial aid agreements are non-binding.
So the only tight end South Carolina signed out of the transfer portal this offseason will not be in Columbia, which could mean the Gamecocks will search for another in the portal shortly.
USC’s transfer portal adds
- RB Raheim “Rocket” Sanders (Arkansas)
- RB Oscar Adaway III (North Texas)
- RB Jawarn Howell (S.C. State)
- WR Jayden McGowen (Vanderbilt)
- WR Jared Brown (Coastal Carolina)
- WR Ahmari Huggins-Bruce (Louisville)
- OL Torricelli Simpkins III (North Carolina Central)
- DL Deandre Jules (Pitt)
- LB Demetrius Knight (Charlotte)
This story was originally published January 4, 2024 at 5:58 PM.
