Texas Football: OV hits big with rising 4-Star LB Lander Barton

One of the fastest rising targets of the 2022 Texas football recruiting class, four-star Brighton (UT) linebacker Lander Barton, was on campus last weekend for a key official visit. As one of the most important visitors on campus that is also a key target of the 2022 class over the weekend, Barton was an important person to watch in his reaction in the days following.

And this was a good time for Barton to get a visit on campus for a key game weekend for the Longhorns. To open up Big 12 play this fall, new head coach Steve Sarkisian and the Longhorns dominated head coach Matt Wells and the Texas Tech Red Raiders at home at Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium by the final score of 70-35.

Barton also got to be on campus during a weekend with a number of other extremely highly-touted 2022 and 2023 prospects. That included the likes of five-star defensive prospects in Cy Park linebacker Harold Perkins and North Shore cornerback Denver Harris.

Texas football comes out of key visit weekend with 4-Star LB Lander Barton with indications looking positive

Buy all indications, this visit was a huge hit with Barton. Texas got a huge win at home, at some of their top linebackers played well. Senior DeMarvion Overshown had himself a nice bounce-back game with some key stops against Tech.

And former walk-on linebacker Luke Brockermeyer had a great game in his own right, including his first career interception.

The 6-foot-4 and 215-pound Barton got to hold his second official visit in the span of the last three weeks with Texas over the weekend. He also took an official visit with the Michigan Wolverines back on Sep. 11. It looks like this recruitment really could boil down to Texas and Michigan, as he’s high on both schools at this point in time.

This is really a recruitment that Texas is going all-in for down the stretch for this cycle. After missing out on the likes of four-star Evanston Township linebacker Sebastian Cheeks to Mack Brown and the North Carolina Tar Heels during the summer, Texas turned elsewhere for help at this position in the 2022 class.

Texas has new co-defensive coordinators/linebackers coaches Pete Kwiatkowski and Jeff Choate as the top recruiters after Barton. That shows how invested Texas is in the recruitment of this Utah linebacker.

And while Texas is still very much in the running to land a commitment from Perkins in the 2022 class, getting a commitment from a blue-chip like Barton would do a great deal for this group.

Barton is one of the higher-rated linebacker targets left on the board for the Longhorns 2022 class at this point. He ranks as the nation’s No. 268 2022 high school prospect, No. 29 linebacker, and No. 2 prospect out of Utah (247Sports Composite). And the Top247 ranks him as the nation’s No. 187 high school prospect, No. 21 linebacker, and No. 2 prospect out of Utah.