On Wednesday, I ran down the various travels of Pat Narduzzi over the last two weeks of the contact period. We tracked the Pitt head coach through pretty much every stop he made; or, at the very least, we confirmed a minimum of one stop for every day Narduzzi was on the road since Dec. 2.
But there was one day we hadn’t confirmed yet. We had our suspicions and educated guesses, but we weren’t sure about where Narduzzi was planning to be on Thursday.
Well, we confirmed it, and as we suspected, Narduzzi spent Thursday in California.
Along with tight ends coach Tim Salem, Narduzzi was mostly in the Los Angeles area for the day. That included the expected visit with quarterback commit
Ty Dieffenbach, but he had a few other visits that were pretty significant.
- One visit was with
Kyle Williams, a transfer receiver from UNLV who graduated from Hawthorne High School - near LAX - in the recruiting class of 2020.
Williams had a good career at UNLV. He was the Mountain West Freshman of the Year in 2020 and was named to The Athletic’s Freshman All-America Second Team after he caught 35 passes for 426 yards and two touchdowns in six games.
In 2021 he pushed his totals to 42 catches, 601 yards and two more touchdowns, and this past season, he played nine games and caught 40 passes for 541 yards and five scores. That gave him three-year totals of 117 catches, 1.568 yards and nine touchdowns in 25 games.
After he entered the portal on Dec. 5, Williams picked up offers from Pitt, Cal, Washington State, Arizona, Oregon State, Colorado State, Hawaii, San Jose State and Fresno State.
I’ve also been told that Notre Dame and Michigan State are pushing for Williams, and he has heard interest from Penn State, West Virginia, Syracuse, Georgia, Rutgers, Cincinnati, Virginia and Boise State.
The big question is where Williams will visit this weekend. From what I can gather, it sounds like it will come down to a decision among Pitt, Cal and either Notre Dame or Michigan State; one of them will get an official visit this weekend and likely be in the driver’s seat to land his commitment.
Williams is getting on a plane today; it’s just a matter of figuring out where he’s flying to. Pitt is very much in the mix, but we’ll see if he comes in for a visit.
- The other visit Narduzzi made in the Los Angeles area was to see St. John Bosco receiver
Israel Polk.
Polk got his offer on Thursday after showing up on Pitt’s radar about two days earlier. He had been committed to Colorado State but he reopened his recruitment late Wednesday night. About 13 hours later, the Panthers offered and immediately got him locked up for an official visit this weekend.
Polk plays for a loaded St. John Bosco team that went 13-1 this season and won a state championship. They are led by
Pierce Clarkson, the four-star Louisville quarterback commit who was a target for Pitt earlier in the recruiting cycle, and 2024 running back
Cameron Jones was the team’s most prolific scorer with 20 touchdowns.
But Polk was the Braves’ leading receiver, catching 26 passes for 458 yards and eight touchdowns. Those numbers may not jump off the page, but he did outpace fellow 2023 receiver
DeAndre Moore, a four-star prospect who is committed to Louisville, and Polk finished as the third-leading scorer on a championship team that is No. 1 in the USA Today Sports Super 25 national high school football rankings.
That’s impressive.
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Now Polk is coming to Pitt for an official visit, and as is the case with the other two high school prospects visiting this weekend, I think the Panthers are in the driver’s seat.
- A quick note of interest: while looking up St. John Bosco’s national ranking, I noticed some other familiar teams in the Super 25:
4. Miami Central - with Pitt commit
Lamar Seymore
11. St. Frances Academy - with Pitt commit
Isaiah Neal
14. Lakeland (Fla.) - with Pitt commit
Shadarian Harrison
If Polk ends up committing to Pitt, it seems pretty impressive to have commits on four of the top 25 high school teams in the country.
- Narduzzi also made a trip to Inglewood High School during his day in California (he and Salem were busy). Four-star tight end
Jamari Johnson, who took an official visit to Pitt last weekend, attends Inglewood, but Narduzzi and Salem just met with Inglewood’s head coach during Thursday’s visit, though, since Johnson had already left town for his official visit to Oregon.
So the efforts are still being made, but my sense that Pitt probably would’t get Johnson unless they landed him on his official visit feels pretty accurate.
- Speaking of tight ends, the
AJ Barner saga took a few interesting turns on Thursday. Word emerged that the Indiana transfer was set to visit Michigan this weekend - a surprising twist after Barner looked like a probable get for Pitt last week. The Wolverines are one of the newer entrants in his recruitment, but they took a strong position, and with him locking in a visit to Ann Arbor, it seemed like this was all but sewn up.
Except that wasn’t the whole story. Because while Barner does plan to visit Michigan this weekend, he was actually in Pittsburgh Thursday morning to meet with offensive coordinator Frank Cignetti. The morning visit gave Barner a quick look at the Panthers and certainly seemed more positive than the earlier news of his planned Michigan visit, but it still seemed like the end result was inevitable.
There were more developments coming, though. It turns out that Barner’s visit to Michigan is only one of three planned visits this weekend. Before he gets to Ann Arbor, Barner is going to take an unofficial visit to N.C. State and make a return trip to Pitt.
This time, he’s hoping to meet with Narduzzi and Salem, who - as we mentioned - were in California on Thursday.
I still think Pitt is going to have to play from behind here, just because Michigan is Michigan and the Wolverines have the added punch of being in the playoffs this year. But Barner’s early strong interest in the Panthers plus his two visits in three days make me think Pitt has a shot. They’ll have to impress him enough to survive the subsequent visit to Michigan, but there’s at least enough of a chance that we’re going to monitor this throughout the weekend.
Continued...
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