Monday, July 11, 2011

recruiting board update

Now with moar oranj.  I was going to do this Tuesday like I normally do, but it was too eventful a weekend to hold off.  UVA picked up a big deal of a commitment in Courtnye Wynn, the last of the Norfolk Christian quartet to commit, and third to choose UVA.  Plus this comes with a bonus depth chart update at the end.

As ever, board here and map here.  Changes:

- Moved DE Courtnye Wynn from blue to orange.  Huzzah. Wynn had been a UVA lean for a while.  We're getting awfully stacked at DE especially considering how many were in the previous class, but this class has some big fellas that could easily become DTs.  Wynn is one.

- Added WRs Jamall Brown and Adrian Gamble to orange.  You remember Gamble.  The news has come officially out of Jeff White Land that Gamble will spend a year prepping at Fork Union, so that means he backs himself up a year and joins the class of 2012.  It's a strange story: Gamble committed in the fall of 2009, and what with prepping and then probably redshirting and whatever else, it'll probably be four years between committing and seeing the field.

As for Brown - surprise.  London has been doing some of that this year - offering guys he seems to think are way-overlooked.  Brown missed most of last year with a broken wrist and even when he did play, he was playing for an offense that threw the football less than Woody Hayes in a bad mood.  So nobody knows anything about him.

- Added TE Kyle Dockins to blue.

- Removed DT Nigel Williams and DE Eli Ankou from green.  Ankou to UCLA, Williams to VT.  Williams was largely a UVA-VT battle, which VT won.  Getting Wynn makes that not really a big deal.  It'd be nice to hog all the talent but there just isn't room to do that.

- Moved CB Mike Tyson from yellow to green.

- Removed WR Leonte Carroo, RB I'Tavius Mathers, and OLB Devin Vandyke from red.  Vandyke, unsurprisingly, committed to VT, and the other two aren't worth following any more, especially as the class tightens up.

- Moved LB Quanzell Lambert from yellow to red.  That means removing "most-wanted" status (as highlighted in orange) which now goes to WR Canaan Severin.

Believe it or not, space is getting tight.  With 16 in the class now - including Gamble - there's room now for maybe six or seven more players.  Because the latest round of attrition has dropped the scholarship number below 85, any more prepping players from the '11 class won't change the number of available spaces, fortunately.

How will the rest of the class fill out?  Best guess:

- Two spaces for Eli Harold and Anthony Cooper, who are halfway in the class anyway.
- A running back.  Please please please we need a running back.  Either one of Kye Morgan (who's probably going to Rutgers) or Chris Mangus would be just what we need.
- At least one more DB, or one more WR besides Cooper.  Another WR - Severin would be a great addition - would mean Maurice Canady could scoot to the defensive backfield.
- At least one more LB.  It's not crazy-talk to think of Demeitre Brim or maybe even Max Valles at linebacker, but if Brim moves up it only makes the DB situation worse.  VT has like a zillion linebacker commits, which could help push Trey Edmunds toward Charlottesville.  That would be great; even greater would be to see the staff put the full-court press on Kaiwan Lewis and/or Ken Ekanem.

That leaves a couple discretionary spots; one or two, mayyyybe three.  If it were up to me I wouldn't use them on sleeper types; either go big or bank a schollie or two for what looks like a stacked 2013 class in-state.

Of couse, this needs to go in tandem with the necessary depth chart update caused by Jeff White's attrition news.  Ausar Walcott has been reinstated for a little while now after the Harrisonburg brouhaha; the other two actors in the scene - Mike Price and Devin Wallace - are officially gone.  That means Anthony Mihota needs to be stored in bubble wrap and carefully unwrapped on Saturdays.  And the cornerback situation: oy.  It's Chase Minnifield and pray that the other guy doesn't get a weekly torching.

The other missing player is Hunter Steward, who London implies didn't have such good grades.  Steward was most recently listed at DT, but he hadn't really ever got onto the field and his ever-changing position means that losing him doesn't create any depth disasters.

Anyway, the new depth chart is here.

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