Holt wants to do whats best for him

PALO ALTO, Calif. – South Jordan (Utah) Bingham High tight end Austin Holt was ready to put the recruiting process behind him. He had just made an oral commitment to BYU, turning down offers from Oregon, Stanford, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin and several others. But then he received a call from the Florida coaches asking him to take a look at them before he officially settled on a school.

That call then threw the whole process on its ear. Holt, who is 6-foot-5 and 225 pounds, went from set on his future to wanting to make sure he was making the right decision.

"The attention hasn't stopped at all since I committed," he said. "It's actually gotten a little worse. After I committed to BYU, Florida called and said if I de-committed from BYU, I could go play at Florida."

That got him thinking. Had he passed up any other opportunities that he needed to explore?

So he and his father then set out to Los Angeles a few weeks back and he took an unofficial visit to UCLA. Then he was in Palo Alto, Calif., this past weekend for the NIKE Training Camp and an unofficial visit to Stanford for their junior day on Sunday. Plus, now he's got plans set to go check out Florida this summer.

"I just got back from UCLA a couple of weeks ago," Holt, who was one of the better tight ends at the camp, said. "I have never been there before, and I really liked it there. I was at Stanford's junior day, and I really liked it up there. I had never been there before, and it's really pretty nice.

"The whole June is pretty swamped with our high school stuff, but we're actually going to go out to Florida. My grandpa actually lives out there in Tampa, so we're going to use that to see him and then go to see Florida."

Holt said he's stayed in constant contact with the BYU coaches through this whole process. The Cougar coaches know he's exploring his options, but they're also doing their best to convince him to stay true to his word.

"I've been up front with the BYU coaches about everything," Holt said. "They're telling me to hang in there, keep strong and keep going, you know. They text me a lot and they called me when they could. I've known them a long time. They're the first people to offer me, and they're the guys that have been around the school the most. I know them personally.

"It'd be hard to turn my back on them, but I'm going to end up doing what's best for me and what's best for what I want to do."

And what that will be at this point is still up in the air.

"I don't know what's best for me," Holt said. "I wanted to visit a lot of schools before I made a decision, and I did. But I didn't see Stanford or UCLA, but I got to see them after it. And then I'm going to go see Florida. I told BYU that I'll probably make my final decision in July some time and then everything will be all settled.

"I thought it'd be at the end, but then it got confusing. "

There's not much to be confused about with Holt's game. He's one of the top players in Utah and a member of the Rivals250 players to watch for the Class of 2008.

"I think I did pretty good on the one-on-ones and the ball drill type of things," Holt said about his performance at the NIKE Camp. "I thought it was a little better this time around. It was more of a competition this time around. It was bigger than it was up at Oregon, which makes it a lot more fun."