Texas football the ‘clear leader’ ahead of summer for 5-Star Jerrick Gibson

This is a busy time on the recruiting trail for Texas football coaches as the spring evaluation period has a lot of them on the road on a consistent basis. Texas coaches such as running backs coach Tashard Choice are busy going around the country this spring visiting some of the program’s top priorities in the 2024 and 2025 recruiting classes.

A top name to watch this offseason for Choice and the Longhorns that the Texas RB coach has connected with multiple times in the last few months is the elite five-star IMG Academy running back Jerrick Gibson. The No. 1 ranked running back in the nation in the 2024 class is clearly a top priority for Choice and the Longhorns on the recruiting trail.

Gibson has already visited Texas twice in 2023, including for the spring game on April 15. The spring game unofficial visit that Gibson took to the 40 turned out to be an “amazing” trip for the elite Florida running back recruit.

He also had a successful visit unofficially to the Forty Acres for the first Junior Day of the offseason, on Jan. 21.

Texas football continues to be out in front for 5-Star RB Jerrick Gibson this spring

We’ve talked on the site before about how Texas appears to be the leader in this recruitment after two highly successful unofficial visits for Gibson in the last four months. It sounds like Texas still sits in a great spot in the race to land a commitment from Gibson heading into the summer.

Jason Suchomel of Orangebloods reported on May 10 (subscriber content) that the buzz surrounding this recruitment of late is that Texas is the “clear leader”. He also mentioned that he’ll “be on commitment watch” when Gibson makes the official visit to Austin on the weekend of June 24.

That is a vote of confidence in a recruitment that Texas had plenty of buzz in the last few months. Suchomel is not the only recruiting reporter/analyst for Texas that has confidence in the Longhorns in this recruitment either.

There are six Rivals publishers/analysts that have entered FutureCasts projecting Gibson’s commitment to Texas. You can find a similar trend in the 247Sports Crystal Ball Predictions and On3 RPM picks. All told, there are more than a dozen reporters/analysts from the major recruiting services that have forecasted Gibson’s commitment to Texas in the last few months.

It’s really difficult not to have a lot of confidence in both Texas’ standing among the top schools in this recruitment and the strong relationship that Choice has with Gibson. There is more than enough information out there for me to say that the Longhorns hold the pole position in this recruitment heading into official visits next month.

Gibson will make his official visit to Texas from June 23-25. He is also set to officially visit the Georgia Bulldogs (June 2), Miami Hurricanes (June 9), and Tennessee Volunteers (June 16). Texas could wind up getting the final official visit from Gibson this summer, which would be huge if Choice and this staff could make a big move to try and start shutting down this recruitment in late June.