3 elite recruits Texas basketball can win over with a deep run in March

Liam McNeeley, F

A top priority for the Longhorns on the recruiting trail in the 2024 class for more than a year now is the elite five-star Montverde Academy forward Liam McNeeley. The Richardson, TX, native 6-foot-8 and 190-pound forward has continued to see his recruitment blow up on the national scene in the last few months.

Since the fall, McNeeley received offers from Kansas, Arkansas, and the Michigan Wolverines. He’s also solidified his spot as a top-25 ranked recruit in the nation in the 2024 class according to most of the major recruiting services.

McNeeley’s recruitment exploding on the national scene in the last few months really proves how valuable it was for Texas to get its foot in the door early with the elite forward. Texas offered McNeeley in the summer of 2021. And he’s visited campus multiple times unofficially since he was originally offered roughly 18 months ago.

While McNeeley has visited Texas more times than any other school unofficially (three times since the 2021 offseason), it’s getting close to 10 months since his last trip to the 40. Getting McNeeley back to campus for an official visit next offseason is a necessary move that Texas needs to make in this recruitment to stick around among the top schools as he starts to narrow down his top list of schools.

And it sounds like Texas was in the process of getting McNeeley on the books for an official trip to Austin in the last few months. But the coaching situation for the Longhorns will definitely impact this recruitment. A piece from Zagsblog last month that provided an update on McNeeley’s recruitment gave a peak into Texas’ standing with the Richardson native.

"“I was pretty close with Texas before. I still talk to coach [Chris Ogden] but we gotta rebuild that relationship.”"

It clearly looks as if Terry and assistant coach Chris Ogden have some work to do to re-kindle the relationship with McNeeley. Former Texas head coach Chris Beard was in pretty frequent communication with McNeeley, and his departure did set back the Longhorns in this recruitment a good bit.

However, there was a point in time when the rise of the Texas program was making a big impression on McNeeley. A deep postseason run could be exactly what Terry and the Longhorns staff need to catch McNeeley’s attention and begin rebuilding this connection between Texas and the Montverde Academy standout.