Texas Football Recruiting: How big of loss was 5-star Bru McCoy to USC Trojans

It won’t take long for the 2019 Texas football recruiting class to be locked up before National Signing Day, but missing out on Bru McCoy is a big loss.

One of the bigger losses on the recruiting trail for the 2019 Texas football recruiting class came over the course of the Under Armour All-American game this week. Five-star Santa Ana, CA, athlete Bru McCoy went with the USC Trojans over the 2019 Texas football recruiting class with his decision late in this recruiting cycle.

On Jan. 6, McCoy announced his commitment and signed National Letter of Intent with head coach Clay Helton and the Trojans. This was one of the biggest recruiting announcements for the USC football program in the past two or three cycles. The 2019 Texas football recruiting class seemed to be the second favorite to land McCoy if he didn’t choose with the in-state blue blood USC.

However, USC won out for this elite Mater Dei High School prospect that would be among the best signees in the 2019 Texas football recruiting class. This group is still without a five-star signee, which is something that is holding the Texas Longhorns out of the nation’s top 10 ranked classes for the 2019 cycle per 247Sports Team Composite Rankings.

According to the 247Sports Crystal Ball Predictions, the final odds for McCoy’s commitment decision favored him landing with USC at an 88 percent chance. His odds to sign with the 2019 Texas football recruiting class sat at just eight percent. Some of his other suitors that fell in line behind Texas and USC included the Washington Huskies and UCLA Bruins.

The battle to land the first five-star signee for the 2019 Texas football recruiting class is going to be nearly impossible for head coach Tom Herman at this point. McCoy was the final shot pretty much for the Horns to land an elite five-star prospect for the 2019 recruiting cycle.

Moreover, this was the second five-star commit in the 2019 USC recruiting class that could fit into the program at wide receiver. Five-star Orange, CA, wide receiver Kyle Ford could fit in alongside McCoy as an elite part of a very talented USC receiving corps.

A big reason for McCoy to choose the Horns was the shot an immediate playing time. But, Texas is getting some key pieces in the receiving corps back like rising senior Collin Johnson. His return to the Forty Acres killed a big pitch that the Horns could use to gain some intrigue from McCoy.

The major question looming for the 2019 Texas football recruiting class after the Under Armour All-America game is how big of loss McCoy will be in the end. The good news for the Horns is that the two likely positions McCoy could fill on either side of the ball are two of the deeper spots in the 2019 class. As far as losing a five-star prospect goes for a program like the Horns, that helps mitigate the sting of the miss quite a bit.

Nabbing a five-star signee sounds great for the Horns, and certainly helped out during the 2018 campaign in the cases of freshman safeties Caden Sterns and B.J. Foster. But, the Horns aren’t going to be impacted too much by missing out on McCoy since the depth of this recruiting class can help makeup for the loss.