Texas Football: 5-Star LB Harold Perkins pushes USC OV to visit Austin

Really good news surfaced for the 2022 Texas football recruiting class and new head coach Steve Sarkisian heading into the weekend. According to a report from Horns247 (paid content) on June 10, the elite five-star Cy Park 6-foot-3 and 200-pound linebacker Harold Perkins is set to take an unofficial visit to Texas this weekend.

Perkins was reportedly set to have an official visit with head coach Clay Helton and the USC Trojans this weekend, but that got pushed back. This is obviously good news for the Longhorns, who weren’t originally scheduled to have an official or unofficial visit with Perkins in the month of June.

Given that this is such a big visit weekend in general for Sark and the Longhorns, it looks like Perkins could be visiting campus at the perfect time. Texas has its big unofficial visit weekend lined up with some of their top targets of the 2023 recruiting class on campus at the same time that Perkins will be in Austin.

Critical importance of Harold Perkins to the 2022 Texas football recruiting class

There are also some other noted big-time targets of the Longhorns 2022 class on campus for visits this weekend, including four-star offensive lineman Cole Hutson and four-star defensive end commit Zac Swanson, among others. Texas could really build a lot of momentum in the pursuit of Perkins’ commitment by having him on campus this weekend for an unofficial visit.

With how much the rival Texas A&M Aggies and LSU Tigers have moved in favor of the schools that are frontrunners to land Perkins at this point of the offseason, it looks like Texas needs to make up some ground. But that doesn’t mean that Texas isn’t one of the top schools for Perkins right now too.

Texas has new special teams coordinator and recruiting ace Jeff Banks as the primary coach in pursuit of Perkins. Meanwhile, Texas A&M has defensive coordinator Mike Elko and linebackers coach Tyler Santucci after Perkins as his top recruiters.

It’s clear how big Perkins could be for the Longhorns 2022 class. He ranks as the nation’s No. 14 2022 high school prospect, top overall linebacker, and the No. 4 prospect out of Texas (247Sports Composite).

Some of the other visits that Perkins has in line come with the Oregon Ducks (Nov. 26) and Florida Gators (Sep. 17). With how late some of the visits Perkins has scheduled are set for, his decision might not come down until after the Early Signing Period.