[Update]: Here's my scouting report on Mitchell that I just did for the mothership. --Wescott

There aren't many remaining needs in the 2014 class for the Texas Longhorns, but the one glaring area of concern is at defensive end.

The only current commitment is from Lancaster defensive Daeshon Hall and though he reiterated that he's still committed to Texas ($) in an interview with Hookem.com published on Tuesday, he didn't rule out taking more visits and simply indicated that the staff wants him to communicate any potential visits beforehand.

Not quite enough to move Hall from a soft commitment back to a solid commit, but it is better than a decommitment, which seems more unlikely now than it has for some time.

As for Alief Taylor defensive end Torrodney Prevot, he's a long way off from making a decision and it's not clear whether any of the schools he has visited (LSU, Texas, Texas A&M) or plans on visiting (Oregon) have an edge on the others, making his recruitment a virtual toss-up at this point. Les Miles did send a Mother's Day card to his household that apparently made Mama Prevot's day, so maybe the Mad Hatter gained some ground for the Tigers there.

In other words, the worst-case scenario for Texas of Hall decommitting and Prevot going elsewhere is quite plausible, even if it isn't likely. Having a back-up plan in place and perhaps even pursuing it sooner rather than later would make sense.

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Jake Raulerson is a football player.

For those who have actually been paying attention to the 2013 Texas recruiting class, that's hardly a revelation. He's a kid who would look at home in a leather helmet. He's also a prospect who had his choice of schools, as Texas head coach Mack Brown made clear to him following a 2011 summer camp in Austin:

"Son, you can play football anywhere in the country, I just hope it's at Texas," said the Texas head coach, according to Jake's father, Jay.

However, Brown seeing and accepting his unique versatility was a key to the Celina lineman's recruitment -- when other schools were talking about him as a guard or a center or even Alabama wanting him as a Jack linebacker, Brown talked about getting Raulerson on campus and then worrying about where he would play, indicating that he wasn't caught up in specifying a position early, something that resonated with the Raulersons.

After all, Raulerson had dominated that summer camp to the extent that strength and conditioning coach Bennie Wylie walked over and told him that he was the best lineman at the camp, on both sides of the ball, regardless of age. According to ESPN, Brown at one point called out a challenge ($) to the assembled talent, wondering aloud whether anyone could stop the irresistible force and immovable object from Celina.

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It's nice being the hunter rather than the hunted for a change, no?

As most BON readers have no doubt heard about by now, rumors have been flying fast and furious the last few days about Florida State having a serious interest in moving to the Big 12. Or, more precisely, the comments of certain prominent figures connected with the university (Wes Haggard, the head of the Board of Trustees) and its football program (head coach Jimbo Fisher), and the subsequent reaction by many of the school's supporters and alums, have ripped open the facade of the ACC being one big happy family.

Never mind the fact that Haggard has walked back his comments a bit and that FSU's president is attempting to disavow any interest. As we witnessed from A&M's move to the SEC, once key individuals, egged on by their alumni and fanbase (go take a look at this 600+ comment discussion on Tomahawk Nation and get a sense on how vigorously pro-Big 12 a strong majority of its readers seem to be), start considering greener pastures (whether real or illusory) elsewhere, events might unfold with such a momentum that moving becomes the only option.

There's not much I can add substantively which hasn't been reported up already. (Read this Andy Staples piece from today if you want a good summary of how this has gone down.) And it's way too early to get a good feel on how this will play out. Forget about what course of action FSU may or may not eventually choose to pursue: we have very little public indication about whether DeLoss Dodds the Big 12 would like to expand back to a descriptively-correct number of teams even if it had a big fish like FSU there for the taking.* (And who knows what if anything ESPN, which just signed the contract -- which had Haggard [seemingly erroneously] up in arms -- with the ACC, making the conference its biggest content provider around, is doing behind the scenes to keep FSU in place.)

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It's once again that wonderful time of year when I'm working late into the night putting together the annual football preview magazine, when four hours of sleep feels like a lot and an unhealthy amount of my waking thoughts are devoted to Texas football and the upcoming season. Which is how I came to be lying in bed at 3:30 a.m. last night thinking about some of the things that had the greatest potential to derail what is shaping up to be a pretty promising 2012 season.

The focus here is on things that, first of all, could plausibly occur, and second, would be most damaging to the Longhorns in 2012. "Greg Davis is rehired to replace Bryan Harsin" is terrifying, but implausible. "Walk-on Cody Ramirez tears his ACL" is plausible, but of minimal impact to the team's prospects this fall.

There's enough that could go wrong that you could stay up all night thinking about it, but after the jump are five of the things I particularly worry would prevent Texas from having the 10-win type of season many are hoping is within reach. Good news, though: although this post is devoted to cataloguing the things that could knock the team off track this fall, our good friends at Barking Carnival will be publishing the companion post to this topic, highlighting the developments that have the greatest potential to help Texas have an outstanding 2012 season -- perhaps even ending in a BCS Bowl. So when you're done fretting here, head over to Barking Carnival to replenish your optimism.

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The 2012 U.I.L. Track and Field State Meet took place on the UT campus Friday and Saturday, and one of the most decorated athletes at the meet was Fort Worth Southwest sprinter Robert Rhodes. Running against the best Class 4A competition, Rhodes took home two gold medals for winning the 200 meter dash and anchoring Southwest's 4x100 meter relay team, and a silver for anchoring his school's 4x200 meter relay team. (For a more detailed report of his state meet exploits, along with video: click here.)

It was an emphatic end to the 2011-2012 athletic year, which began with Rhodes as a relative unknown and ended with him sporting football scholarship offers from the likes of Texas and Texas A&M, among others. In between, he set records in football, earned district honors in basketball, and showed himself to be one of the fastest sprinters in the state.

He was scheduled to meet with the Texas football coaches during the weekend, according to multiple reports, and he has said he plans to make his college decision before the end of the school year, so barring a change of plans, we should know by the end of the month whether Rhodes will be a member of Texas's 2013 football signing class.

After the jump, more on Rhodes's athletic accomplishments from the past nine months, and what one of his coaches had to say about his work ethic and character.

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DAY TWO RESULTS:

Longhorn Football signees/offers -
Adrian Colbert (Mineral Wells), Class 3A 4x100 meters - 3rd place (41.65); 400 meter dash - 8th place (49.38); 200 meter dash - 1st place (21.45)
videos: 4x100 relay, 400 meter dash, and 200 meter dash

Notes: Future Longhorn defensive back Colbert and his Mineral Wells 4x100 relay teammates ran their best time of the season and set a new school record, but it wasn't enough to catch the teams from Stafford (41.34) and Celina (41.41), who both ran much faster than they had all year. (Celina and Stafford finished 1st and 2nd in the final team points standings.)
Running in the 400 meter dash, which he won at the state meet in 2011, Colbert ran hard but was unable to defend his title against one of the fastest 3A groups to ever run at state. He looked good for the first half of the race, then got passed by Celina's Zack Bilderback on the final curve and looked like he had run out of gas with with 125 meters to go. (Either that, or he knew he had no chance of medaling at that point and decided to go on cruise control the rest of the race and save what energy he had for the 200 meter dash, which was less than 40 minutes away.) Even had he matched his winning time at state from a year ago (48.27) he would not have threatened the leaders, as Bilderback won in 47.27 and each of the top 4 runners had sub-48 second times, which is commonplace for 5A and 4A but hasn't happened in 3A since the 1999 state meet. Colbert staggered to the finish line in 8th place out of the 9 runners, clocking a 49.65 that was a half-second slower than his regional time.
He redeemed himself in the 200 meter dash, running a strong last 100 meters despite going against the wind, and winning a close finish in 21.45 (0.14 separated first from third place).

Bryson Echols and Don'tre Wilson (DeSoto), 1st and 2nd legs of 4x100 meter relay - 1st place (40.09); 1st and 2nd legs for 4x200 meter relay - 2nd place (1:24.62)
videos: 4x100 relay and 4x200 relay

Notes: DeSoto already owned the fastest 4x100 relay time in the nation this year and on Saturday they ran at their best and appeared to have nearly flawless handoffs on the baton exchanges, something that had reportedly been a problem for them earlier in the year. Mansfield Timberview, owner of the nations 2nd best time coming in, was thought to be DeSoto's toughest opponent, but Don'tre Wilson and Tremayne Acy staked DeSoto to a big lead running the 2nd and 3rd legs, before (2012 New Mexico football signee) Ridge Jones finished things off with a good anchor leg and finished 0.49 ahead of 2nd place Galena Park North Shore (the schools would also end up finishing 1-2 in the team standings). Timberview actually fell significantly behind, particularly on the 3rd leg, and was in 5th or 6th place when anchor Aldrich Bailey got the baton, but he shot down the final straightaway like a missile, getting Timberview into 3rd place and very nearly catching the North Shore anchor.
In the 4x200 relay, which DeSoto also had the nation's best time in going into the meet, DeSoto recorded a very good time but simply got outrun by a (on this day) faster Galena Park North Shore team.

Longhorn track signee -
Reese Watson (Spring), Class 5A pole vault - 1st place (17')

Notes: Watson has posted some of the top pole vault heights in the nation this year, and he won gold in a good 5A group that had three other vaulters go over 16'.

Other Day Two runners of interest and Day One results after the jump.

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All the Big 12-2 Conference news that is and isn't fit to read...
And some other stuff.

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