What is latest on Marquette's Colin Porter getting a fifth season?

Marquette men's basketball fans are still waiting to get their first glimpse of Colin Porter.

Who knows if the transfer guard from Liberty will ever appear in a Golden Eagles uniform after suffering a setback in his legal quest for a fifth season of eligibility.

MU coach Shaka Smart held Porter out of the team's intrasquad scrimmage on Oct. 3, a day after the Kentucky Court of Appeals dissolved a temporary injunction in a lawsuit in which Porter and former Menomonee Falls standout Seth Trimble (now at Louisville) are among the plaintiffs.

That lawsuit is still pending. Porter's name is also attached to a similar lawsuit in North Carolina. Players from the class of 2022 recruiting class are seeking fifth seasons because the NCAA has allowed that for the classes that came after 2022.

"Colin is in limbo because of this fifth-year stuff," Smart said. "I guess there's stuff coming up this week with his case.

"So we're just kind of TBD with him, just trying to support him through it. He has been great. I feel bad for him that he's in limbo with this, but he's been awesome with his approach."

This a unique situation for a college basketball coach. It is under a month until MU's first game against Mercyhurst on Nov. 2 at Fiserv Forum.

"Colin is such a great kid," Smart said. "The first thing he said to me is 'I don't want to be a distraction for the team.'

"This was something that we knew when we took him that this could be up in the air, it could be in limbo. We had conversations with people in the NCAA that in this particular case are directly fighting against the fifth-year guys getting eligibility. We decided at that point that it made sense to try to do, but we knew that it wouldn't be 100%.

"Colin knew that as well. He has been phenomenal. Couldn't have been any better in the last five weeks since he's been here. Now our job is to just support the heck out of him. Obviously plan both ways. Prepare both ways, because he's somebody that would definitely make an impact on our team if he can play.

"But if he can't play, then we certainly need to plan for that scenario. Which in all honestly, he wasn't here all summer, so that was something we planning for in the first place."

See iconic 1934 Packard, from famous 1977 Marquette title team photo