recruiting board update

OK, you wanted it, and here it is, but this is not one of those good news updates where I say look at all the future UVA players.  This week we're breaking out the machete and hacking huge pieces off of this thing.

Part of the reason is that VT had their spring game.  Or tried to - it got rained out and denied Shaney Beamer the chance to make snide comments about the relative attendances.  A working theory, which I neither subscribe to nor deny, is that if a recruit wants to commit to VT in late March-early April, Frank tells them to wait and announce it at the spring game so as to create an atmosphere.  I don't really know or care if that's true, but regardless: our junior days tend to be a time for VT to take a few names off their board, and their spring game is the same.  So let's get to the updates, and discussion later.

As always, the board lives here.

-- Added OT Brad Henson and DT Tevin Montgomery to yellow.

-- Moved LB Micah Kiser from green to blue.  Kiser is "focused on two", one of which is UVA.

-- Moved TE Arshad Jackson and LB Peter Kalambayi from yellow to green.

-- Moved ATH Reon Dawson from yellow to red.

-- Removed OLs Parker Osterloh and Braxton Pfaff from blue.  Both to VT.  Damn - I really did think we'd get one of those guys.

-- Removed CB Charles Clark from green.  VT.

-- Removed OL John Montelus (Notre Dame) and DE Shakir Soto (Pitt) from yellow.

-- Removed QB Bucky Hodges (VT) and LB Alex Anzalone (Ohio State) from red.

In case you lost count, that's seven removals, four because they committed to VT.  Tech also picked up a couple other commitments - a linebacker out of Virginia Beach I'd never heard of and a quarterback from somewhere out of state, North Carolina I think, neither of which had UVA offers.  That sounds like a disaster on the surface.  It really isn't.  Here's the deal.

Hodges, of course, was probably Tech ever since we took the Brendan Marshall commitment.  In fact, the coaches probably took Marshall because they knew Hodges was going to Tech.  I don't think they would've otherwise.  It means that we swung and missed on all of the so-called big three quarterbacks in the state, but the table was set for that when we took Greyson Lambert.  And I don't think anyone's complaining about that signing.

Losing both OL is disappointing mainly in the sense that we weren't able to keep them away from Tech.  They're big pickups for Tech because the Hokies absolutely had to get them.  Had to.  Would I have liked to get them?  Yeah.  So that Tech didn't.  It would've killed Tech not to get them, but it doesn't hurt us.  We have one lineman already - Olanrewaju - and if we can get Brad Henson (it's very early but there are positive signs) then we could get Alfred E. Neuman for a third lineman and still have a higher-rated class than Tech at that position.  So, the verdict: Very good for Tech, but not that bad for us.

Finally, Charles Clark - whatever.  We got Tim Harris at our spring game and the Hokies weren't happy about that, and Harris is a thousand years ahead of Clark.

So I would say we got through Tech's spring game pretty much fine.  That's in contrast to last year when J.C. Coleman committed.  Wyatt Teller was in Blacksburg and is still on the board, and if he'd committed then I'd have been singing a different tune here.  But as you can tell by the fact that he's in blue, I very much like our chances there.