8/21/2018 football Edit

Texas Mid-Term Recruiting Report: Oklahoma

Few players have sparked as much rankings debate this year as five-star WR Theo Wease (Nick Lucero/Rivals.com)

Nick Krueger • Rivals.com

Recruiting Analyst

Nick Krueger joined Rivals.com as a multimedia producer in 2011 and has covered recruiting in the state of Texas since 2016. He also co-hosts and produces Rivals' weekly podcast, Commitment Issues.

Football prospects looking to make their college football commitments before the start of their senior season is nothing new in Texas. However, in the first full cycle of changes made to the NCAA football recruiting calendar, many players took advantage of the opportunity to knock out many - if not all - of their official visits from the end of spring through early summer. Many top programs in-state, as well as those out-of-state teams that frequently recruit Texas, have seen their classes fill at an advanced pace with a higher likelihood that products from the Lone Star State will remain committed with an eye on signing their letters of intent in December.

In 2016, 258 players from Texas ranked as 5.4 two-stars or higher signed with Power Five or Group of Five programs. In 2017, that number grew to 297 and again in 2018 to 334. Currently, 216 players in that demographic are committed to Power Five or Group of Five programs in the 2019 class. While the number of signees at the very top of the rankings has remained relatively consistent since 2016, the growth in total players signed during that time is an indicator that the overall quality of talent in the state has grown as well.

With that in mind, and the start of football season just around the corner, now is as good of a time as any to take stock of which teams have recruited Texas most successfully this year. Here is a look at the job Oklahoma has done with the fall approaching.

PERFORMANCE TO-DATE

The Sooners are always expected to have some measure of success recruiting from their neighbors to the south on an annual basis, and 2019 has been good to Oklahoma. Of the four five-star prospects in Texas, two are committed to Texas A&M but the other two - wide receivers Theo Wease and Trejan Bridges - are headed to Norman. Former five-star wide receiver Arjei Henderson is also a headline name in the group and re-committed with Wease when both visited for OU’s spring football game.

Bridges was clearly the biggest positive mover for Oklahoma in the most recent release of the Rivals rankings ahead of this football season, after he climbed 42 spots to land among the latest cast of five-star prospects. Other commitments within the Rivals250 like Austin Stogner and EJ Ndoma-Ogar are on the shortlist of Texas prospects that appear to have the best shot of making a move forward in the fall after slipping a bit over the past few ranking updates. Stogner spent much of last season recovering from an injury that kept him off the field for the early part of the season and Ndoma-Ogar will be the anchor on an Allen High School offensive line looking to make a repeat run at a state championship. Although the names mentioned to this point have been players in the upper-echelon of the recruiting rankings, an impressive and clear-cut head-to-head recruiting win for a prospect from Texas came in a relatively short time frame with addition of three-star offensive lineman Marcus Alexander. Prior to the Sooners sweeping him off of his feet, he had taken several visits to Oklahoma State and appeared to be favoring the Cowboys by the end of spring.

Although Oklahoma has a near top-five recruiting class after the most recent rankings update, there is still room left in its class to pick up another big name from Texas and the two names that stand out most heading into the season are Odessa-Permian athlete Peyton Powell and Katy-Seven Lakes defensive athlete David Ugwoegbu. Powell seemed as though he was headed for Ohio State prior the trouble head coach Urban Meyer has recently found himself in and he postponed a preseason commitment to see how things would play out, giving the Sooners an opportunity to get in better with another top offensive playmaker. Ugwoegbu has been a little tougher to decipher when it comes to which of his top-three teams - that also include Alabama and Texas A&M - have the best opportunity for him, but he’s an impressive athlete that would appear to give a lift to a defense that needs some help with its pass-rush after last season.

MID-TERM GRADE: A+

Obviously, landing two five-stars is a huge deal, and that plays a big part in the Sooners also having the edge in terms of higher average ranking over rival Texas with the same number of players committed from the state. Few big names are left on the open market in Texas, so there might not be a whole lot more action to speak of in terms of splash commits from south of the state line, but if there could be an added bonus to the haul of top pass-catchers from the state, it’s that they were all paired with newly-minted five-star quarterback commit Spencer Rattler at The Opening and looked completely in-sync with him already during the event’s 7-on-7 competition.