Three visits are informative for WR Smith

Downington (Pa.) West junior wide receiver Louis Smith and his father, Louis Smith Sr., recently visited three schools from the Atlantic Coast Conference. Those trips proved to be very informative for the 6-foot-1, 160-pound receiver.

Maryland, North Carolina and Duke all appear to be very interested in Smith, as evidenced by the attention they gave to the junior wide out while he was in town.

His father spoke with Rivals.com and recapped each of those trips.

"Within the last week and a half we've been to Maryland, North Carolina and Duke," Smith's father said. "First of all, we were impressed with all of them.

"We took the Maryland trip last Saturday and that was their junior day. They gave the red carpet treatment to us and all of the other top prospects there. The campus is beautiful. We went out and saw them in their spring practice and that was real exciting. Their guys were real enthusiastic and they were doing a lot of hitting. They did one-on-one's and a little bit of everything. My son's eyes were huge after all of that.

"We talked to the coaches and met all of them. The last thing we did was break down into positions with the positional coaches. The wide receivers coach was very interested. He liked our film and he said he likes all-around receivers that can catch, run after the catch and block. He wanted us to keep in contact and he invited us to their senior one-day prospects camp for evaluation."

If the trip to Maryland was a success then it sounds as though the trip to North Carolina was off the charts.

"That one blew him away," his father laughed, referring to their visit to UNC. "We had an academic tour and they offer some great degrees. They have a great (academic) program, so we were already impressed with that.

"Louis was talking to the recruiter for our area who already knew we were coming. As soon as our tour was over he met us. They practiced with pads and shorts so they weren't hitting but they were real intense.

"Coach Marcus Berry, our recruiting coordinator, talked to Louis pretty much the whole practice. After practice we had a one on one tour with coach Berry. It's impressive what those guys are into. He was constantly talking to Louis. He said he heard about him at the Premier Showcase and at the Badger 7-on-7. It was the same scenario as Maryland. They want us to keep in contact. Their senior prospect camp is also in June and they definitely want him to come."

Duke head coach David Cutcliffe has done a good job of getting prospects to at least visit Durham before they make a decision over the past couple of years, and Smith was there as well. How did that go?

"Unfortunately we didn't get a good view of the football side of Duke," his father continued. "Coach gave everyone the day off for Good Friday. We did an admissions tour and the academics blew us away. That's a really prestigious school.

"They knew we wanted to see the athletic side of things so after the (academic) tour we walked over to the facilities and saw the football stadium. The Duke tour was mostly all academics but it was impressive."

Earlier in the year Smith and his father also took visits to Rutgers and Pitt. This summer Smith will camp at Boston College, Rutgers, Maryland, North Carolina and Pitt in June.