Sting Factor: Ashton Cozart's flip from Oklahoma to Oregon
When a major program loses a key recruit, Rivals.com takes a look at how big of a blow it is to the respective school, analyzing it from a local and national level. To quantify the “sting” of each decommitment, we assign a score from one to 10, with one being no big deal and 10 being a catastrophic hit.
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THE STORYLINE
Ashton Cozart was committed to Oklahoma for about four months but recently the high three-star receiver planned an official visit to Oregon, which would have contradicted Sooners coach Brent Venables’ no-visit policy for committed players.
But it didn’t seem to matter. The Flower Mound (Texas) Marcus standout who is originally from the Pacific Northwest was heading to Eugene and the writing was on the wall that a flip to the Ducks would happen.
It did during the visit and now Cozart is the second wide receiver in Oregon’s class along with four-star Jurrion Dickey. Just like how former coach Mario Cristobal had success recruiting nationally, first-year Oregon coach Dan Lanning has now gone to five different states for the Ducks’ five prospects.
There have been some major decommitments for the Sooners in this recruiting class through a massive coaching change but Cozart is the first one not connected to Lincoln Riley’s decision to leave for USC.
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LOCAL REACTION
“Right now with a new coaching staff there is so much of a perception is reality for Oklahoma. So anytime they lose a commitment I think it is amplified a little bit in the national perception of what is happening in Oklahoma’s 2023 recruiting class. The loss of Ashton Cozart, the wide receiver who had been committed since February, is a painful blow because he's a talented receiver that fits pretty well within what Oklahoma wants to do offensively from the receiver position. Recruiting wide receivers has not been a problem for Oklahoma prior to the arrival of Brent Venables and gauging by the response from receivers around the country there is a lot of optimism about the future of Oklahoma's offense under Jeff Lebby as well.
“Again, the perception is a painful reality for Oklahoma not just in that they lost a commitment and how that will be seen and viewed by many but also because Cozart was one of their more active recruiters and was a guy working hard for them in arguably their most important metro area of Dallas. Cozart definitely was an important recruit but as long as Oklahoma can find the talent it needs at receiver and start to land some of those guys in the relatively near future they should be fine.” - Josh McCuistion, SoonerScoop.com
Sting factor: 7
NATIONAL REACTION
“Cozart is a very talented receiver and Oklahoma has lost a huge share of the best receivers in the country when Riley left for USC but the Sooners will be just fine and plenty of talented players will still want to play in Norman. Brent Venables is an endless ball of energy on the recruiting trail and in his entire coaching style.
With Jeff Lebby, DeMarco Murray, Cale Gundy and others on the offensive side, Oklahoma will deliver skill players in recruiting and then turn them into high-level players on the field. If Cozart wanted to go elsewhere, that is a loss because he is a talented receiver but there are plenty of fish in the sea and Oklahoma will get its fair share. I’m not worried about the Sooners’ recruiting abilities at all.” - Adam Gorney, National Recruiting Director
Sting factor: 4