The college football transfer portal continues to reshape rosters across the country— including at the Division II HBCU level —and Clark Atlanta head coach Teddy Keaton isn’t sugarcoating his thoughts. On the latest episode of The Teddy Keaton Show, presented by HBCU Gameday, the coach delivered a raw, unfiltered breakdown of how HBCUs like CAU must navigate the ever-evolving landscape.
“It all depends on who that kid is and how much value he’s created for himself as an individual,” Keaton said when asked if he lets players return after entering the portal. “There’s a lot of coaches that have that philosophy to say that their best player got in the portal and they’ll say, ‘Well, I’m not going to let him come back.’ But that’s not the way of the world no more.”
Keaton, whose HBCU squad went from multiple losing seasons to a 7–3 record, emphasized honest conversations and player development over ego.
“It’s all about the conversation that happens before the conversation,” he said. “A lot of coaches don’t have exit interviews, meetings with their kids. Can you win with that kid? Can that kid help me keep my job?”
The longtime HBCU coach stressed that it’s not just about talent—it’s about fit, academics, and mindset. “First of all, did he create value for himself wherever he was at?” Keaton said of transfers. “Can he do the academics that is stressed at Clark Atlanta University? Third, is he a good fit?”
Keaton also took aim at what he calls “barbershop talk”—the false narratives surrounding former D1 players dropping down to HBCU programs.
“And then we don’t think about the mindset of a kid when he drops from a ranks of Alabama or Florida or these places and nobody else in that Power Five/ Group of five anywhere else see any value for him. And now he’s talking…He’s still in that portal and he thinking about, okay, now I’m at D2.
“What is his mindset?A lot of them don’t come in with that mindset,” he said. “When they come down, they expect to not really work. I’m banking off what I’ve already did somewhere else… but you find out when you come to D2 that there’s a lot of football players.”
He wrapped the conversation by stressing what makes the HBCU experience unique. “We suffer from that at Division II, because if he fails, it’s never going to be his fault. We all, as coaches, try to take it on our shoulders.”
