Welcome to one of the most important weeks in college football: It’s the start of the transfer portal for the 2022-2023 offseason cycle. Buckle up. It’s going to be a wild ride.

College football now has its own equivalent of pro sports free agency. Players look at their own situations and come to the conclusion that for various reasons — playing time for some, coaching fit for others, winning games for others — it’s best to pack up and go somewhere else.

The transfer portal officially opened on Monday. Over 1,000 players have already entered or at least expressed an intent to enter the portal. We have our national transfer tracker to keep tabs on a lot of notable names.

Here, we present our USC transfer tracker. Right now, it has players headed out, but soon enough, we’ll be able to add new players coming in to play for Lincoln Riley in 2023.

We’ll update and refresh the list below as needed:

Julien Simon leaves USC

Linebacker Julien Simon is the first USC player to make his transfer intentions known. Though, it’s like a number will follow because now a days transferring is just apart of the college football off-season.

Tayler Katoa leaves USC

Tayler Katoa has played football in four years due to injuries and his Mormon mission.

His senior year in high school (Layton, UT) he played linebacker, defensive end and quarterback. He had 36 tackles, 2 sacks and a fumble recovery for a TD on defense, while on offense he ran for 784 yards on 117 carries (6.7 avg) with 14 TDs and threw for 299 yards with 3 TDs and 3 interceptions on 21-of-55 passing (38.2%) in 2016.

Xavion Alford

Ralen Goforth -- UPDATED: Will transfer to Washington Huskies

The update on December 19:

How can Lincoln Riley stock his roster? Louisville could be an outlet

This story coming out of Louisville could create a stampede of UL transfers to USC and other programs looking to scoop up talent. Louisville had a top-20 transfer portal class last season, and that class could now re-enter the portal, though we’ll see if Louisville can hire Jeff Brohm and limit the damage. You’ll want to follow the Louisville situation as one of many transfer portal sources of intrigue.

We’ll keep updating the USC transfer list below. Stay tuned.

Jake Smith transfers again out of USC

Fomer four star WR Jake Smith was named first team All-State as a junior and senior in high school in Scottsdale (AZ) and the Arizona Gatorade Player of the Year and the Gatorade National Football Player of the Year in 2018.

At Texas, Smith caught 48 passes for 568 yards and 9 touchdowns in two years as a Longhorn.

Smith was sidelined over the course of the 2021 season due to a lingering foot injury and is now transferring out of USC.

Incoming Transfer: Eddie Czaplicki from Arizona State

Incoming Transfer: Jamil Muhammad from Georgia State

Incoming Transfer: Kyon Barrs

Arizona football transfer DT Kyon Barrs commits to USC

DL Kyon Barrs, who played high school football at Murrieta Mesa (Calif.), is a graduate transfer with one year of eligibility left.

Incoming Transfer: Dorian Singer from Arizona

Story originally appeared on Trojans Wire