I have too many words written in this thing to go too lengthy on the intro, so I'll be succinct: this is a recruiting notebook rounding up news and notes on about two dozen recruits that I've gathered over the last week or so. It won't feature any QB stuff, but I should have a separate post on that this afternoon. I'm going to lead with the two bits of bad news here so you all can get that out of the way and focus on the fun stuff. Unless otherwise noted, all prospects are in the class of 2018.
- Rivals250 Cleveland (Ohio) defensive lineman Tyreke Smith says he hasn't been speaking with Pitt much any more and I don't get the sense that the Panthers are seriously involved here. He likely ends up at Ohio State, but Penn State, USC, Notre Dame, Michigan, and others will push.
- Rivals250 Cincinnati (Ohio) defensive tackle Aeneas Hawkins also appears to have moved on from Pitt as a serious option in his recruitment despite his early affinity for the school. Ohio State, Penn State, USC, and Cincinnati are the four school he's been talking with most often.
- Did Rivals100 Baltimore (Md.) defensive end Eyabi Anoma sneak in a little secret visit to Pitt? I haven’t been able to confirm if he actually made it to campus, but Anoma was in Pittsburgh for a basketball tournament on the weekend of April 22nd. Prior to actually getting to the city, he told me he wanted to visit when he was there. Pitt continues to work on the ultra-talented Baltimore-area defensive end.
- We haven't heard much from Rivals250 defensive back Jairus Brents of Kentucky since he received his Pitt offer, but he reached out to me to let me know that that had changed recently:
“The receivers coach, Kevin Sherman, came by school last week. Me and my boys (three-star speedster WR) Rondale Moore and (2019 four-star defensive end) Stephon Herron are going to visit down there this summer," Brents said. "I’m going to try to cut down my list by the end of summer, so I want to take a lot of visits.”
Brents and Moore have both been offered by Pitt, while Herron has not yet. I'd imagine that will change on the visit, as Herron is a likely Rivals100 guy and one of the country's best defensive linemen in my opinion.
- We have a holding pattern for Staten Island (N.Y.) ATH Zihir Lacewell, who holds a Pitt offer as a wide receiver/linebacker prospect. Lacewell tolds me he still wants to visit Pitt and is targeting this summer as the time to do it, with no specific date locked in.
- Two more prospects in holding patterns are a pair of key Pitt offensive line targets. There are no new visits scheduled for Blake Zubovic, who I still feel ends up at Pitt in the long run. That Penn State offer made some people pause, but I think Pitt remains in the driver's seat. Not sure if Penn State will have room and not sure if they would have beaten Pitt if they did.
- Ohio offensive tackle Jimmy McKenna has been a Pitt lean for a long, long time, dating back to when the Panthers were the first school to offer him in the fall. Although he recently took a visit to Purdue, one of the other schools pursuing him for months, I don't have any reason for concern. McKenna tells me he doesn't think he'll take any more visits before his decision ("as of now"), although he still hasn't picked a date to announce. It's supposed to come in May, so we'll know that decision soon enough. I think he's a Panther.
- Florida defensive back Stanley Garner told me back in March that Pitt would absolutely make his top group, shortly after they offered him. Garner is now targeting some point shortly after May 19th to release that top group. May 19th is his high school's spring game and the list will be a top ten. Look for Tennessee, Ole Miss, Miami, Kentucky and South Carolina to be other schools that make the cut.
- New Jersey linebacker Vinny DePalma is another key Pitt target and he is also working on narrowing down that list, which I would certainly expect Pitt to be locked in for and potentially leading: “I don’t have any visits planned right now, but I’m not sure about the summer. I’m going to wait until the end of the spring evaluation period (which ends on May 31st) and then start narrowing my list down," DePalma said.
- Let's continue on with the linebackers. Here's Florida linebacker Khalan Tolson, a prospect for whom Pitt has already made the top group: “I haven’t planned any visits yet, but I’m working on that over the summer. My top five is a top six now and I’ve added Syracuse to Pitt, Indiana, Iowa State, USF, and UCF. I’d like to visit all of those places.”
- Oh, you want another LB? Don't mind if I do. Here's a three-star from Michigan and recent Pitt offer, Kolin Demens: “I had been in contact with coach Narduzzi since he was at Michigan State and we just started to get back in contact about a month ago. It was nice to get reunited," Demens said.
- Another freaking linebacker? You're damn right. Pitt offered a Florida kid, Abraham Beauplan, in the class of 2018, who flies beneath the radar. Former Raiders player Derrick Crudup is his head coach. He caught up with me and told me a bit about Beauplan, who’s a super quiet kid. Said he thinks he’s as good of an athlete as has ever come through Boynton Beach and is a killer at linebacker at 6-foot-1 and 230 pounds who can run and move in space. Georgia Tech and Pitt are his two big offers and a lot of other Power Fives have sniffed around.
- Here's my last linebacker, 2019 Ohioan Jamir Thomas, a teammate of 2017 Pitt OT target Thayer Munford at Massillon. You may recall Thomas from my glowing review of him after I saw Massillon play McKinley: “I was really excited to get the Pitt offer since I had visited there a couple of times before that," Thomas said.
- Here's another recent Pitt offer, Teja Young, a 2018 ATH from the same neck of the woods as Jerry Drake in the Palm Beach area. Pitt joined Illinois and Glenville State, a D2 school, in offering: “This was a surprise, I hadn’t heard much from Pitt before this, but then coach Partridge came up to the school and told my coach that he had offered me.”
- Maryland safety Raymond Boone has held a Pitt offer for quite a long time now and although there's been a bit of a dip in contact recently, he intends to visit this summer: “I’m coming up to Pitt some time in June for a visit. I haven’t been talking to them as much, but I still want to visit," Boone said. "I’m trying to check out Alabama, Virginia Tech, Temple, Syracuse, Stanford, Ohio, and maybe some others will come up.”
- Washington (D.C.) Gonzaga has produced a number of Pitt targets over the last few years and the latest is offensive tackle Aidan Rafferty. Rafferty has held a Pitt offer for quite some time and visited last summer and he may repeat that this year: “I’ve been keeping in touch and texting with Pitt’s coaches," Rafferty said. "They’re one of the schools I want to see this summer. I’m definitely going to take some visits and go to some camps, I just don’t have anything planned yet.”
- Rivals250 Cleveland (Ohio) defensive lineman Tyreke Smith says he hasn't been speaking with Pitt much any more and I don't get the sense that the Panthers are seriously involved here. He likely ends up at Ohio State, but Penn State, USC, Notre Dame, Michigan, and others will push.
- Rivals250 Cincinnati (Ohio) defensive tackle Aeneas Hawkins also appears to have moved on from Pitt as a serious option in his recruitment despite his early affinity for the school. Ohio State, Penn State, USC, and Cincinnati are the four school he's been talking with most often.
- Did Rivals100 Baltimore (Md.) defensive end Eyabi Anoma sneak in a little secret visit to Pitt? I haven’t been able to confirm if he actually made it to campus, but Anoma was in Pittsburgh for a basketball tournament on the weekend of April 22nd. Prior to actually getting to the city, he told me he wanted to visit when he was there. Pitt continues to work on the ultra-talented Baltimore-area defensive end.
- We haven't heard much from Rivals250 defensive back Jairus Brents of Kentucky since he received his Pitt offer, but he reached out to me to let me know that that had changed recently:
“The receivers coach, Kevin Sherman, came by school last week. Me and my boys (three-star speedster WR) Rondale Moore and (2019 four-star defensive end) Stephon Herron are going to visit down there this summer," Brents said. "I’m going to try to cut down my list by the end of summer, so I want to take a lot of visits.”
Brents and Moore have both been offered by Pitt, while Herron has not yet. I'd imagine that will change on the visit, as Herron is a likely Rivals100 guy and one of the country's best defensive linemen in my opinion.
- We have a holding pattern for Staten Island (N.Y.) ATH Zihir Lacewell, who holds a Pitt offer as a wide receiver/linebacker prospect. Lacewell tolds me he still wants to visit Pitt and is targeting this summer as the time to do it, with no specific date locked in.
- Two more prospects in holding patterns are a pair of key Pitt offensive line targets. There are no new visits scheduled for Blake Zubovic, who I still feel ends up at Pitt in the long run. That Penn State offer made some people pause, but I think Pitt remains in the driver's seat. Not sure if Penn State will have room and not sure if they would have beaten Pitt if they did.
- Ohio offensive tackle Jimmy McKenna has been a Pitt lean for a long, long time, dating back to when the Panthers were the first school to offer him in the fall. Although he recently took a visit to Purdue, one of the other schools pursuing him for months, I don't have any reason for concern. McKenna tells me he doesn't think he'll take any more visits before his decision ("as of now"), although he still hasn't picked a date to announce. It's supposed to come in May, so we'll know that decision soon enough. I think he's a Panther.
- Florida defensive back Stanley Garner told me back in March that Pitt would absolutely make his top group, shortly after they offered him. Garner is now targeting some point shortly after May 19th to release that top group. May 19th is his high school's spring game and the list will be a top ten. Look for Tennessee, Ole Miss, Miami, Kentucky and South Carolina to be other schools that make the cut.
- New Jersey linebacker Vinny DePalma is another key Pitt target and he is also working on narrowing down that list, which I would certainly expect Pitt to be locked in for and potentially leading: “I don’t have any visits planned right now, but I’m not sure about the summer. I’m going to wait until the end of the spring evaluation period (which ends on May 31st) and then start narrowing my list down," DePalma said.
- Let's continue on with the linebackers. Here's Florida linebacker Khalan Tolson, a prospect for whom Pitt has already made the top group: “I haven’t planned any visits yet, but I’m working on that over the summer. My top five is a top six now and I’ve added Syracuse to Pitt, Indiana, Iowa State, USF, and UCF. I’d like to visit all of those places.”
- Oh, you want another LB? Don't mind if I do. Here's a three-star from Michigan and recent Pitt offer, Kolin Demens: “I had been in contact with coach Narduzzi since he was at Michigan State and we just started to get back in contact about a month ago. It was nice to get reunited," Demens said.
- Another freaking linebacker? You're damn right. Pitt offered a Florida kid, Abraham Beauplan, in the class of 2018, who flies beneath the radar. Former Raiders player Derrick Crudup is his head coach. He caught up with me and told me a bit about Beauplan, who’s a super quiet kid. Said he thinks he’s as good of an athlete as has ever come through Boynton Beach and is a killer at linebacker at 6-foot-1 and 230 pounds who can run and move in space. Georgia Tech and Pitt are his two big offers and a lot of other Power Fives have sniffed around.
- Here's my last linebacker, 2019 Ohioan Jamir Thomas, a teammate of 2017 Pitt OT target Thayer Munford at Massillon. You may recall Thomas from my glowing review of him after I saw Massillon play McKinley: “I was really excited to get the Pitt offer since I had visited there a couple of times before that," Thomas said.
- Here's another recent Pitt offer, Teja Young, a 2018 ATH from the same neck of the woods as Jerry Drake in the Palm Beach area. Pitt joined Illinois and Glenville State, a D2 school, in offering: “This was a surprise, I hadn’t heard much from Pitt before this, but then coach Partridge came up to the school and told my coach that he had offered me.”
- Maryland safety Raymond Boone has held a Pitt offer for quite a long time now and although there's been a bit of a dip in contact recently, he intends to visit this summer: “I’m coming up to Pitt some time in June for a visit. I haven’t been talking to them as much, but I still want to visit," Boone said. "I’m trying to check out Alabama, Virginia Tech, Temple, Syracuse, Stanford, Ohio, and maybe some others will come up.”
- Washington (D.C.) Gonzaga has produced a number of Pitt targets over the last few years and the latest is offensive tackle Aidan Rafferty. Rafferty has held a Pitt offer for quite some time and visited last summer and he may repeat that this year: “I’ve been keeping in touch and texting with Pitt’s coaches," Rafferty said. "They’re one of the schools I want to see this summer. I’m definitely going to take some visits and go to some camps, I just don’t have anything planned yet.”
