Recruiting Country: The latest recruiting news surrounding the Maroon & White

Key notes from Recruiting Country

• The visitor list has gone out for this weekend. It is extensive. It is the only place that you would find a list that exhaustive. That is a correct list. Regardless of what you read elsewhere, our information is most of the time, first, but all of the time, it's accurate. Discretion is the better form of valor, right? I have been working in recruiting for a long time now. Things come and go. That is just how it is like Coke doesn’t concern itself with Pepsi, or McDonald’s with Burger King.
   
• We are still adding to our list of visitors for this game. We think it may grow. It is already around 100 people. The headliners here are Tank Jones‍, edge rusher out of Mobile, who you lost the head-to-head with Oregon. Getting him on campus is huge. Is Jones going to move his life all the way to Eugene, Oregon? It is far in the corner. There are a lot of steps involved in getting to Eugene. He is a kid of the likes of Marco Jones. He is an immediate impact player. 
   
• KJ Ford‍, out of Duncanville, A&M had pulled the reins on him after he committed to Florida. Getting him to come is big. For the class, we feel really good about how you feel about all of them. There are still battles you are fighting.
   
• The 2027 visitor list is not going to get a lot of attention, but some of the best talents in the country are on that list. Derek Miller and his team, the students and staffers... If a coach can’t be with a player for 45 minutes, can others step up and be able to do it? Mike Elko talks about how the help from the student workers has been impressive. It is an integral part, because when visitor lists are that large, there aren’t enough people. So you have to trust people outside the inner circle. The 2028 list is really good, too.
   
• Utah is incredible. Utah is the second most beautiful place I’ve been to, besides the U.S. Virgin Islands. Texas is flat. Salt Lake City, Park City, the scenery is like the “take your eyes off the road” kind of views. It is actually dangerous. Past that, I got to see Helaman Casuga‍ in a real game. Up to this point in the season, he had been impeccable. Throwing for a lot of yards and touchdowns.
   
• They played Lone Peak out of Highland, Utah. Corner Canyon is the school Casuga goes to. They put out Jaxson Dart and Devin Brown. It is a very good quarterback unit for a high school. Lone Peak has only lost one game thus far. They have five Power Four commits. They have some real dudes. They have two defensive players going to Utah, and an offensive lineman going to BYU.
   
• Casuga was trying to do all he could. He turned the ball over five times. Early on, you could see that Corner Canyon was in trouble. Two of the interceptions were not his fault. One of them he got hit as he threw it. He was due for a bad one. He played badly, and he’d probably tell you it was his worst game in his career. But what he scored a ton of points for me is that after, he came up to me, thanked me for coming.
   
• He is coming to the A&M game this weekend. He didn’t point any fingers. He kept his composure and was respectful despite a bad night. I loved his attitude. He made a couple of throws where I was super impressed. There were some elements to the game where you were like he is the real dude, but how he handled himself after was what scored a lot of points for me.
   
• This was probably the matchup against the best two schools in the state. It was packed, though. They had smaller stands, but it was all taken up, standing room only. Probably around 4,000 to 5,000 people. The view there was the best. Texas football is supreme, but the backdrop in Utah was sweet.
   
• When you look at the calendar for the remainder of the season, we are about to go for a month with only road games. So to not having the Kyle Field high point recruiting pitch for a month is tough. When they come in the summer or spring, that is nice. But you sell it in the fall, to go to Kyle Field, and see it in front of them. You have to do all you can to get these kids to campus over the next few weeks.
   
• Nebraska had a bad loss against Michigan. Michigan dominated them. The score is flattering Nebraska. They had a bunch of their top prospects in. As results-oriented things are for coaches and teams, for these recruits, they care about the experience. Enjoy the sizzle, not the steak.
   
• Over the next few weeks, we are making sure everyone stays aligned. Formulate a plan so that no kid feels left out. You don’t want to keep players later than their designated time. We don’t want to be running late and having the recruits have nothing to do when they are here. We need to deliver the experience. Jason Howell has two games in Dallas. Waxahachie vs DeSoto. Waxahachie beat Duncanville last week, which made headlines. There was a fight there, not a huge brawl.
   
• Dillon Mitchell‍ is electricfyingly fast. He has run 10 sub-100 meters. Houston Legacy plays Franklin, I’ll be there. Houston Legacy is where Mike Brown‍ plays. They don’t have a playoff structure. They play 12 games, and that is it.