Which Wolfpack Defenders Left in the Transfer Portal?
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RALEIGH — The transfer portal giveth, the transfer portal taketh away. While NC State football loaded up on both sides of the field with talented new transfers into the program, the program also lost a handful of key players over the last month, as they sought new homes for a variety of reasons.
Most of the critical losses for the Wolfpack came on the offensive side of the football, but there were several defenders who opted for new chapters away from Raleigh. Those exits hurt the Pack, as the team is also set to lose a plethora of talent to the NFL and to graduation.
Which NC State defenders bolted?
- Defensive lineman Josh Alexander-Felton
- Defensive lineman Blair Alexander
- Defensive lineman Justin Terrell (Sam Houston State)
- Linebacker Kenny Soares Jr. (Michigan State)
- Linebacker Kelvon McBride (Marshall)
- Linebacker Terris Dudley (UConn)
- Linebacker Joshua Ofor (Arkansas State)
- Linebacker Elijah Groves
- Safety Zack Meyers
- Safety Daemon Faegan
- Safety Terrente Hinton (Marshall)
- Cornerback Jivan Baly
The impact of the outgoing transfers
While head coach Dave Doeren and the Wolfpack lost a sizable chunk of depth options on the defense to the transfer portal, none of the players listed above were significant contributors during the 2025 season outside of linebacker Kenny Soares. He opted to reunite with his first college coach, Pat Fitzgerald, who recently signed on to be the Spartans' head coach.
Outside of Soares, NC State didn't lose any players who appeared poised for larger roles in the upcoming year and the team worked hard to plug the holes it did have. The defensive line depth took some hits, mostly with Brandon Cleveland and Travali Price graduating and the pass rush was left diminished by Cian Slone and Sabastian Harsh's exhausted eligibility and decision to explore the NFL draft process. The team needed to use the portal to replace those pieces.
Many of the outgoing players predated the hiring of DJ Eliot as defensive coordinator. Under new defensive leadership, the Wolfpack underwent a fairly significant schematic overhaul, while some of the players left over from Tony Gibson's regime struggled to fit into the new system. Kelvon McBride and Renté Hinton opted to join Gibson's new program at Marshall, where he struggled in his first season as head coach with a brand new roster.
There will need to be some major development amongst the returning defensive players if the Wolfpack wants to be competitive on that side of the football in 2026, but Eliot proved to Doeren he could find diamonds in the rough out of the transfer portal in the 2025 season.
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Tucker Sennett graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in Sports Journalism from the esteemed Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. A former basketball player, he has gained valuable experience working at Cronkite News and brings a deep passion for sports and reporting to his role as the NC State Wolfpack Beat Writer On SI.
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