Rivals Reaction: Darwin Barlow, Tamauzia Brown commit to TCU

TCU saw its 2019 class get a big lift with the commitments of four-star prospects Darwin Barlow and Tamauzia Brown on Thursday afternoon. The pair joined Newton teammate Josh Foster, who committed to the Horned Frogs earlier this month, to give a boost to a program that held just two other four-star commits: Iowa quarterback Max Duggan and Aledo, Texas, defensive end Colt Ellison. Barlow and Brown have both been fringe Rivals250 talents going back to last year, and further fill out the offensive cast the Frogs have coming in.

The first expectation is that both will make this less of a boom-or-bust class. TCU had some other interesting offensive prospects committed already, but Barlow and Foster give the offensive skill group in this class a more solid baseline to work from. Players like Daimarqua Foster and Dee Winters are both players that have shown that they have ability, but haven’t been heavily recruited by other programs.

Brown had primarily been looking for an opportunity to play wide receiver, but mutual interest from teams has come-and-gone. Most have recruited him as an athlete, but getting a crack at receiver first was an important consideration - along with joining familiar faces.

As a receiver, Brown is a solid overall talent that runs with power across the middle and can get over the top of the secondary downfield. Pepper in some of the acrobatic catches that he’s shown he can make over the past few years, and his potential as a playmaker on offense is of little doubt.

Barlow is a tough but patient runner who finds his gaps and the edge looking to make the sure play first before racking up yards after contact. Along with Foster, TCU adds two versatile backs that should be able to get their feet wet with some reps this season before taking the spotlight in the next few years.

In the case of Barlow, there are a few programs that would have liked to have brought him aboard, starting with Oklahoma State. Although the Cowboys haven’t been overly aggressive recruiting running backs in 2019, he would have represented the top player committed in their class thus far. Barlow also took officials to Minnesota and Arkansas, but with two close friends headed to TCU and a sister at nearby North Texas, the decision to stay in-state was all the more appealing. In Brown’s case, there didn’t seem as many teams pressing for him down the stretch as the hope was that he would try his hand at defensive back first with receiver as a Plan B, rather than the other way around. The Horned Frogs seemed pretty the pretty clear favorite for him in recent weeks, but the other teams that shied away from him are now the most likely to regret not making him a bigger priority once he gets involved in TCU’s offense.

The dominoes that everyone had been waiting to fall were Barlow and Brown following Josh Foster’s commitment. Now that they’re on board, the next big recruit coming out of Newton is 2020 defensive end James Sylvester. While the personal connection between the 2019 trio is seemingly more insulated, the influence on him seems like an obvious side effect. Otherwise, this is mission accomplished for TCU, as it seemed as though the likelihood of all three ending up at the same destination had gotten thinner through the end of summer. Now, the better part of the Frogs’ class is complete and there are just a few more key targets to focus on this fall.