Gary Goff got a belated Christmas present when spring classes started at McNeese State.

Expecting 15 new players on campus, the McNeese head coach got a 16th gift under the tree.

Linebacker C.J. Rias, a late addition to the transfer portal, signed with the Cowboys at the last minute.

Rias led South Alabama in tackles for loss last season with 11, including four sacks. He ended the season with 36 tackles, 23 of them solo.

“He is an electric player,” Goff said. “We are excited to have him.”

After his late entry into the portal, Rias visited McNeese and quickly signed with the Cowboys.

“It all happened very fast, in about 48 hours,” Goff explained. “I don’t think a lot of people knew he was in the portal or they would have been after him.”

Rias joins 15 other newcomers in the quickly growing McNeese program.

The 6-foot-2, 235-pound Rias played in 11 games as a third-year sophomore for the Jaguars in 2021. He was a three-star junior college recruit, as ranked by 247Sports.com, which listed hime as the fifth-best JC linebacker in the country in 2020.

Rias gives McNeese 25 new players. Goff and the Cowboys have 92 players expected to be in camp this spring, up from 56 a year ago.

That number includes five quarterbacks thanks to the two McNeese got this year from the transfer portal.

“What a difference a year makes,” Goff said. “Last year we had to take timeouts after running a few plays in practices because we didn’t have enough healthy bodies.”

Goff said the Cowboys have one scholarship remaining.

“This is such a big difference from last year,” Goff said. “We were really scrambling just to get people in here. Now we can pick and choose a little bit.”

McNeese opens practice on March 8 with the spring game set for April 1.