Fact or Fiction: Georgia is team to beat for five-star Justin Scott
Rivals national analysts Clint Cosgrove and Ryan Wright - along with Jed May from UGASports.com and Eliot Clough from GoIowaAwesome.com - tackle three topics and determine whether they believe each statement is FACT or FICTION.
MORE FACT OR FICTION: Penn State will sign more than half of the top 10 prospects in Pennsylvania this year | Kevin Sumlin will help jumpstart Maryland's recruiting efforts in the 2024 class
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1. Georgia is now the team to beat for five-star Justin Scott.
Cosgrove's take: FICTION. This is a hard one, as I see Georgia being neck and neck with Notre Dame for the five-star out of Illinois, but it is hard for me to go "fact" when I'm not even sure if Scott could definitively tell you the team to beat in his recruitment right now. The Georgia offer carries plenty of weight as the Bulldogs were one of the first schools he mentioned to me as a sophomore shortly after receiving his first offer and that was before Scott was even a blip on the national champion's radar. While I see Georgia having as good of a chance as any to land Scott, I'm still not ready to say the Bulldogs are definitely the team to beat.
May's take FACT. Scott originally planned to commit on Jan. 31. Then an offer from Georgia and a conversation with defensive line coach Tray Scott prompted Scott to postpone his commitment. He’s now taking an official visit to Georgia for the spring game, a weekend that will give him the chance to see everything the program has to offer. Other schools such as Notre Dame are still strong contenders and can’t be counted out, but there’s no doubt Georgia has the momentum.
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2. The Midwest will continue to receive increased recruiting attention from the SEC moving forward.
Cosgrove's take: FACT. The SEC offered 143 recruits from the Midwest in 2022, 150 in 2023 and has already offered 124 in the 2024 class. The increased level of exposure and "globalization" of recruiting leads me to believe that the SEC will continue recruiting elite Midwest prospects at a high level for the foreseeable future. Missouri joining the conference seemed to to give the Midwest recruits a little SEC bump, and the addition of Oklahoma should do the same. Then you look at the caliber of recruits the region has coming up in the 2024-2026 classes and it almost seems to be a foregone conclusion that we will see a yearly increase in Midwest SEC offers through at least the 2026 recruiting cycle.
Wright’s take: FACT. College football conference realignment continues to change the landscape of recruiting. With Missouri and Kentucky on that Midwest borderline, it makes sense for those teams to go after top players in bordering northern and western states. Tennessee is another SEC team that can recruit both the Southeast and Midwest effectively because of its geographical location, tradition and recent success.
The blueblood programs like Alabama, Georgia and LSU can go wherever they want, instantly receiving a prospect’s attention. In 2024, add Oklahoma and Texas into that mix, as they have the ability to pull from Illinois, Michigan, Iowa and Indiana.
As college football moves more and more to a super conference era, bigger recruiting battles will be waged for the top players on the national scene. NIL can be a game-changer, giving prospects an extra reason to leave the comforts of their home state for an opportunity to play in the SEC.
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3. Iowa is a lock for 2025 four-star defensive lineman Iosa Epenesa.
Cosgrove's take: FACT. Epenesa is one of the nation's elite prospects in the 2025 class, and he will likely have close to every major offer in the country by the time his recruitment is finished. That being said, Iowa has too much going for it to not to be the team to beat in this recruitment. And although I'm going out on a limb by saying Iowa is a lock, I see Epenesa following in the footsteps of his dad and older brothers by choosing Iowa City as his destination for college.
Clough's take: FICTION. Iowa is certainly in the running, considering his familial connections. However, Epenesa is one of the top recruits in the 2025 recruiting cycle, and he's already received offers from national powers like Michigan and Tennessee. His 10 total scholarship offers will only continue to increase in the coming months, and he'll have plenty of suitors by the time he makes his final decision.