Texas Football: What to watch for on National Signing Day
By Shane Black
The 2020 Texas football recruiting class has a lot to lose on NSD, though some major announcements on Wednesday could once again move them into the top-ten.
Wednesday, Feb. 5th represents the second and final College Football National Signing Day for the class of 2020. For decades the early February signing period was the only one available to recruits so the hype for fans and angst for coaches was off the charts come post Super Bowl. What does this mean for the 2020 Texas football recruiting class?
Now, however, the newly implemented ‘early’ signing day, which takes play in December, has seen over 70 percent of recruits sign their national letter of intent taking the fun and stress away from Wednesday’s second signing period.
In the two recruiting cycles for Texas where Tom Herman has had his feet under him he has brought in 53 scholarship enrollees which amounted to the third ranked class in both 2018 and 2019. With the ’18 and ’19 classes being so large, 2020 was more about fit and not about shear size.
The Longhorns currently have 17 signees for the class of 2020. 17 is not a bad number, especially when the class’s composite ranking sits at 11th nationally. With that being said, Herman realistically wanted to bring in 20-22 guys in this class.
It is not too late for coach Herman and company to achieve the goal of a 20+ player class, though, they will have to do some late cleaning up on Wednesday.
Just 15 players in 247Sports top-300 player list remained unsigned. Of the unsigned players, Texas is only in the mix for four of them: Alfred Collins, Kelvontay Dixon, Ennis Rakestraw, and Princely Umanmielen. Herman needs to land at least two of these guys, but should he nab all four, Texas would move up to the 7th rated class of 2020.
Let’s take a closer look at these four prospects and when their scheduled commitment times on Wednesday will occur.