We're in the home stretch until early signing day next Wednesday. This upcoming weekend is the last opportunity for coach/player in-person contact as well as official visits. The dead period begins Monday and will last until Friday, Jan. 14.
If you thought it's been somewhat quiet in terms of late action, you're not mistaken. In regards to 2022 prospects, the focus for Gus Malzahn has been visiting and confirming the prior 15 commits. The majority of those already took official visits in the summer, the lone exception being RB Jordan McDonald so he was down here this past weekend.
As far as I know, the 15 commits are solid but the elephant in the room remains Florida and new head coach Billy Napier as their existing class has crumbled in recent days.
I haven't followed all the UF recruiting drama, but there are reports Napier didn't immediately contact their prior commits (which led to an initial rash of decommits) and there have been multiple reports Napier, through an intermediary, asked other prior commits to "record a 15-minute workout video" so Napier could decide if he wants to keep them in the class. That in particular enraged Uncle Luke, who took to Twitter to explain his frustration. Luke is the HC at Miami Edison and coaches DL Francois Nolton, who decommitted on Wednesday.
What if Napier issues late offers to a few UCF commits? How does that change things? Not that it necessarily means anything, but I noticed in the last 24 hours Napier's Twitter account started following a slew of top FL/GA prospects and that group included many UCF commits. So in the wake of a crumbling class, I wouldn't be surprised if they think they can pick off a few players.
Fun fact: UF has more decommits this recruiting cycle (12) than current commits (7).
UCF has about 10 spots left though I'm expecting the bulk of the open spots to go to transfers, but there are a few 2022 high school targets out there.
DT Khurtiss Perry - He took his OV to UCF this past weekend. Obviously one of the best players in the nation, top five is UCF, Alabama, Auburn, Clemson and Texas, though he just tweeted a photo of a meeting with a Texas A&M coach as well. Jordan McDonald and Thomas Castellanos have been on Twitter publicly recruiting him, and obviously McDonald was with him on the visit. He won't announce until signing day, though it's obviously very difficult to recruit a guy from Alabama that has committable offers from Bama and Auburn and he certainly does. If he commits to UCF, it could be one of the biggest recruiting upsets of all time.
LB T.J. Dudley - He was one of the "Bounce House Weekend" visitors from June and at one point there was optimism he could be part of the class, primarily due to his close relationship with DC Travis Williams. He ended up committing to Oregon though, and appeared set to go there until Mario Cristobal left the other day to take the Miami job. One would think UCF could be in good position (and UCF will be a Power Five program in 2023, something that wasn't in place when Dudley committed to UO), though Dudley's recent interviews would appear he prioritizes interest in other programs - Florida, LSU, Auburn, Texas, Florida State, Clemson, Tennessee, Mississippi State, etc. He didn't mention UCF in the On3 clip below and had to be prodded to talk about UCF in the interview with SI. He says he will not sign early now.
RB Xavier Townsend - I know UCF was back in to see him recently, but I haven't heard that he's wavered from his Iowa State commitment.
RB Terrance Gibbs - The Winter Park prospect recently decommitted from Florida. Heard UCF was in the mix but I don't have any further intel besides the likelihood he probably won't sign early.
DT Jordan Phillips - I know UCF has continued to recruit him, but I heard today he is solid to Tennessee.
LB Tavares Elston - He was just offered by UCF this week, a couple days after he committed to Texas Tech. Georgia Tech then followed with an offer. There was buzz a couple days ago that he was going to visit UCF this weekend, but he said today that's not happening and he's solid with Texas Tech. I guess we'll see if that sticks, or maybe he tries to visit in secret?
TRANSFERS
While there's been a lot of entries into the transfer portal, we haven't seen a big number of commitments. Transfers don't have the same sort of deadline that high school recruits do with an early signing day, and I think colleges may want to wait until after early NSD for many of these transfer commits to go public.
UCF hosted two OL transfers this past weekend, Tylan Grable (Jacksonville State) and Cade Briggs (New Mexico). I posted interviews with both earlier in the week.
I had been feeling confident UCF will land Grable, though Auburn is making a late push.
Briggs is visiting ECU this weekend. He said all the right things when I spoke with him - he pretty much said UCF was his No. 1 - but I know UCF continues to go portal shopping as well.
Auburn's Ladarius Tennison, who UCF likes as a safety, told me earlier this week he will be visiting UCF this weekend. He's currently on a Wednesday-Friday visit to Ole Miss. He was at Missouri last weekend.
Then there are a couple local players to watch, CB Dominick Hill (South Carolina) and CB Tommi Hill (Arizona State). Tommi may have the most upside of the two. As a true freshman at ASU this past season, Tommi earned PT amid a veteran group. ASU was very bullish on his future and hates to lose him.
Obviously QB is a portal focus as well. Getting intel on transfers isn't particularly easy, but a few names that could potentially be in the mix:
Adrian Martinez (Nebraska) - He visited Kansas State last weekend and was at Cal this week. I heard UCF bounced around as a third option, but I'm not aware of a planned visit. There was a feeling K-State was the favorite because his girlfriend goes there.
Cameron Ward (Incarnate Word) - One of the best in FCS that entered on Thursday, he'll have a lot of interest. Being mentioned as a top five portal QB.
Spencer Rattler (Oklahoma) - Lots of buzz about South Carolina. Don't think UCF is a consideration of his but I'm including him anyway.
Myles Brennan (LSU) - LSU's initial QB starter before suffering an injury. Have heard he wants to stay in the SEC if possible.
Max Johnson (LSU) - LSU's starter after Brennan went down.
Michael Penix (Indiana) - Tampa native. Injury issues during his time at IU. All four years he suffered a season-ending injury. His 2021 season-ender was a separated AC joint in his throwing shoulder. He had an ACL that ended his 2020 season.
Gunnar Holmberg (Duke) - Duke starter that bided his time before starting this past season.
Chevan Cordeiro (Hawaii) - Pre-existing relationship with G.J. Kinne.
Chubba Purdy (Florida State) - Third string at FSU behind Jordan Travis and KZ.
Jacob Zeno (Baylor) - He was the backup and entered the portal midseason, which then elevated Blake Shapen to backup status - and Shapen is the QB that led the Bears to the Big 12 Championship after starter Gerry Bohanon went down.
We'll see what starts to trickle out of the weekend in terms of visitors - haven't locked down anything 100 percent besides Tennison.
If you thought it's been somewhat quiet in terms of late action, you're not mistaken. In regards to 2022 prospects, the focus for Gus Malzahn has been visiting and confirming the prior 15 commits. The majority of those already took official visits in the summer, the lone exception being RB Jordan McDonald so he was down here this past weekend.
As far as I know, the 15 commits are solid but the elephant in the room remains Florida and new head coach Billy Napier as their existing class has crumbled in recent days.
I haven't followed all the UF recruiting drama, but there are reports Napier didn't immediately contact their prior commits (which led to an initial rash of decommits) and there have been multiple reports Napier, through an intermediary, asked other prior commits to "record a 15-minute workout video" so Napier could decide if he wants to keep them in the class. That in particular enraged Uncle Luke, who took to Twitter to explain his frustration. Luke is the HC at Miami Edison and coaches DL Francois Nolton, who decommitted on Wednesday.
What if Napier issues late offers to a few UCF commits? How does that change things? Not that it necessarily means anything, but I noticed in the last 24 hours Napier's Twitter account started following a slew of top FL/GA prospects and that group included many UCF commits. So in the wake of a crumbling class, I wouldn't be surprised if they think they can pick off a few players.
Fun fact: UF has more decommits this recruiting cycle (12) than current commits (7).
UCF has about 10 spots left though I'm expecting the bulk of the open spots to go to transfers, but there are a few 2022 high school targets out there.
DT Khurtiss Perry - He took his OV to UCF this past weekend. Obviously one of the best players in the nation, top five is UCF, Alabama, Auburn, Clemson and Texas, though he just tweeted a photo of a meeting with a Texas A&M coach as well. Jordan McDonald and Thomas Castellanos have been on Twitter publicly recruiting him, and obviously McDonald was with him on the visit. He won't announce until signing day, though it's obviously very difficult to recruit a guy from Alabama that has committable offers from Bama and Auburn and he certainly does. If he commits to UCF, it could be one of the biggest recruiting upsets of all time.
LB T.J. Dudley - He was one of the "Bounce House Weekend" visitors from June and at one point there was optimism he could be part of the class, primarily due to his close relationship with DC Travis Williams. He ended up committing to Oregon though, and appeared set to go there until Mario Cristobal left the other day to take the Miami job. One would think UCF could be in good position (and UCF will be a Power Five program in 2023, something that wasn't in place when Dudley committed to UO), though Dudley's recent interviews would appear he prioritizes interest in other programs - Florida, LSU, Auburn, Texas, Florida State, Clemson, Tennessee, Mississippi State, etc. He didn't mention UCF in the On3 clip below and had to be prodded to talk about UCF in the interview with SI. He says he will not sign early now.
RB Xavier Townsend - I know UCF was back in to see him recently, but I haven't heard that he's wavered from his Iowa State commitment.
RB Terrance Gibbs - The Winter Park prospect recently decommitted from Florida. Heard UCF was in the mix but I don't have any further intel besides the likelihood he probably won't sign early.
DT Jordan Phillips - I know UCF has continued to recruit him, but I heard today he is solid to Tennessee.
LB Tavares Elston - He was just offered by UCF this week, a couple days after he committed to Texas Tech. Georgia Tech then followed with an offer. There was buzz a couple days ago that he was going to visit UCF this weekend, but he said today that's not happening and he's solid with Texas Tech. I guess we'll see if that sticks, or maybe he tries to visit in secret?
TRANSFERS
While there's been a lot of entries into the transfer portal, we haven't seen a big number of commitments. Transfers don't have the same sort of deadline that high school recruits do with an early signing day, and I think colleges may want to wait until after early NSD for many of these transfer commits to go public.
UCF hosted two OL transfers this past weekend, Tylan Grable (Jacksonville State) and Cade Briggs (New Mexico). I posted interviews with both earlier in the week.
I had been feeling confident UCF will land Grable, though Auburn is making a late push.
Briggs is visiting ECU this weekend. He said all the right things when I spoke with him - he pretty much said UCF was his No. 1 - but I know UCF continues to go portal shopping as well.
Auburn's Ladarius Tennison, who UCF likes as a safety, told me earlier this week he will be visiting UCF this weekend. He's currently on a Wednesday-Friday visit to Ole Miss. He was at Missouri last weekend.
Then there are a couple local players to watch, CB Dominick Hill (South Carolina) and CB Tommi Hill (Arizona State). Tommi may have the most upside of the two. As a true freshman at ASU this past season, Tommi earned PT amid a veteran group. ASU was very bullish on his future and hates to lose him.
Obviously QB is a portal focus as well. Getting intel on transfers isn't particularly easy, but a few names that could potentially be in the mix:
Adrian Martinez (Nebraska) - He visited Kansas State last weekend and was at Cal this week. I heard UCF bounced around as a third option, but I'm not aware of a planned visit. There was a feeling K-State was the favorite because his girlfriend goes there.
Cameron Ward (Incarnate Word) - One of the best in FCS that entered on Thursday, he'll have a lot of interest. Being mentioned as a top five portal QB.
Spencer Rattler (Oklahoma) - Lots of buzz about South Carolina. Don't think UCF is a consideration of his but I'm including him anyway.
Myles Brennan (LSU) - LSU's initial QB starter before suffering an injury. Have heard he wants to stay in the SEC if possible.
Max Johnson (LSU) - LSU's starter after Brennan went down.
Michael Penix (Indiana) - Tampa native. Injury issues during his time at IU. All four years he suffered a season-ending injury. His 2021 season-ender was a separated AC joint in his throwing shoulder. He had an ACL that ended his 2020 season.
Gunnar Holmberg (Duke) - Duke starter that bided his time before starting this past season.
Chevan Cordeiro (Hawaii) - Pre-existing relationship with G.J. Kinne.
Chubba Purdy (Florida State) - Third string at FSU behind Jordan Travis and KZ.
Jacob Zeno (Baylor) - He was the backup and entered the portal midseason, which then elevated Blake Shapen to backup status - and Shapen is the QB that led the Bears to the Big 12 Championship after starter Gerry Bohanon went down.
We'll see what starts to trickle out of the weekend in terms of visitors - haven't locked down anything 100 percent besides Tennison.
