Texas Football: Breaking down 3 most critical visiting recruits this weekend
The first weekend of March brought about a pretty sizable visitor list for Texas football recruiting. Texas and head coach Steve Sarkisian are set to host roughly a dozen visitors, highlighted mostly by some emerging blue-chip targets in the 2024 and 2025 recruiting classes.
Some of the visitors on campus this weekend for the Longhorns are more familiar names that the staff was after for a while now. But most of the visitors this weekend are newer targets on the radar for Sark and the Longhorns staff.
Spring brings about a critical evaluation period for coaching staffs around the college football landscape. It is also one of the most significant seasons in terms of hosting major visit weekends of the entire offseason.
Texas will be no exception to the significance of the springtime on the recruiting trail in terms of the evaluation period and the big visit weekends in the next month or two.
The list of confirmed visitors for this weekend was compiled thanks to Inside Texas (paid content).
Top visitors to watch this weekend for Texas football
With that in mind, here’s a look at a breakdown of three of the most critical visiting recruits for the Longhorns in the first weekend of the month of March.
https://twitter.com/pickett_booker/status/1631783052375408640
Booker Pickett, EDGE
One of the newest offers in the 2024 class for the Longhorns is the highly touted four-star 6-foot-4 and 205-pound Tampa Wharton (FL) edge rusher Booker Pickett. The Florida edge rusher announced on Twitter on March 3 that he received an offer from special teams coordinator/tight ends coach Jeff Banks and the Longhorns.
It looks like Pickett was one of the potential offers that Sark, Banks, and the Longhorns had in mind during this big initial visit weekend in March.
Pickett was on campus for his first unofficial trip to Texas, specifically on March 3. And it sounds like Texas was able to make a good impression on Pickett and his camp from the early returns coming out of his trip to Austin this weekend.
Although, the question will be whether the Longhorns can make up enough ground in this recruitment in the spring and summer to truly push some of the top two or three schools. The Florida State Seminoles, Ohio State Buckeyes, and Miami Hurricanes are widely considered three of the top schools in the race to land a commitment from Pickett.
Pickett has family that played along the defensive front at Miami and Ohio State, respectively. He’s got longstanding relationships with both of those coaching staffs and has taken multiple visits to each campus since the start of last year.
Texas is clearly interested in what the lengthy and skilled edge rusher brings to the table as a potential impact pass-rusher in the 2024 class. Banks and the Longhorns staff will have their work cut out for them to try and make up enough ground in the next few months to close the gap with the likes of Miami, Ohio State, and Florida State.