UM, OSU, UNC visits impress Mitchum

When you’re ranked as the nation’s No. 41 player, a Rivals100 member and a four-star prospect by Rivals.com, you’d think that there would be numerous updates, rumors and even some misinformation floating around about you on the Internet or recruiting message boards.

But for some reason Erie (Pa.) McDowell offensive tackle Kyle Mitchum hasn’t become a hot topic yet with the fans of the schools that have offered him.

Well, that’s about to change because Mitchum is back from a week-long unofficial visit tour that took him all throughout the Midwest and even in the Atlantic Coast Region.

Mitchum, who is 6-foot-6, 265-pounds and has a 5.0-second time in the 40-yard dash, said he just returned from visits to Michigan, Ohio State, West Virginia, Virginia and North Carolina. He’s also in the process of lining up unofficial visits to Tennessee, Iowa and Miami, but those haven’t been set in stone quite yet.

So now that he’s back and had some time to reflect on his journey that had him travel from more than a 1,000 miles on the road, what did he think?

“Michigan was a really nice place,” Mitchum said. “I was only there for a few hours, so it wasn’t like I got to work out during the camp. I just got to tour the campus, meet all the coaches and talk to them about everything. Coach (Lloyd) Carr was a nice guy. I really enjoyed having him show me around and talking to him.”

But Michigan wasn’t alone in impressing Mitchum.

“They all stood out,” he said. “I liked Michigan a lot, but I also liked Ohio State and North Carolina. They were all pretty good, honestly. I was just really trying to see the academic side of things, whom they lose, look at some depth chares and what’s going on with things like that.

“I’m big into weight lifting and I wanted to get on campus and see all the school’s weight faculties. They were all pretty much the same in that factor.”

Mitchum did say that when looking at depth charts alone, he liked what he saw at North Carolina.

“I know they start a lot of freshmen,” he said. “They said they’re not going to pass anybody up if they’re tough enough to play right away. Why sit them on the bench for a year when they have the ability to play right away.”

Good point, and Mitchum has that ability and he has the offers.

With more than 20 scholarship offers on the table, Mitchum rattles off teams like Florida State, Iowa, Miami, Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Tennessee, West Virginia, Virginia North Carolina and others that have all offered and are on his extended list.

But that list is about to be cut down to a more manageable number in the near future.

“I want to get these last unofficial visits to Iowa, Tennessee and Miami out of the way first,” he said. “Then I want to really work hard for a top five by the end of the summer. I want to them take my officials and break them down and ask all of the important questions.”

And helping him along the way will be his coach, Jon Caccione.

“He’s helping me out quite a bit,” Mitchum said. “He’s taking me around to all these places and working with me on what things I need to be looking at. My mom will support my decision, too. It’s great to get feedback from everybody.”

So expect more news from Mitchum in the near future and expect his name to soon become a hot topic because it won’t be long before the excitement builds in the battle to sign this four-star stud.