White and Seastrunk among Spring Game attendees. In an appearance that surely encourages Longhorn fans skeptical about Lache Seastrunk eventually choosing Texas, the Temple star running back made it down to Austin for the second week in a row, having taken in the team-wide scrimmage the previous week. Typically close mouthed about his visit, Seastrunk hasn't spoken to any of the recruiting services about his visit, but a generic "great visit" comment did eventually find its way out of the Seastrunk camp. As with many recruits, Seastrunk's mother may be the most important factor in the process and she was likely the driver for Seastrunk as he came down to Austin, though there is no verification of that. If she was in attendance, there's no doub that Mack Brown took the time to give her his best sales pitch.
The breaking news with Seastrunk is that he will visit Auburn this weekend ($) with close friend Trovon Reed, a former Texas target who has now fallen off the radar with the other wide receiver commitments in the class and the emphasis on securing Darius White. I wrote recently that I thought that Seastrunk Auburn interest was a dalliance, but it appears that the interest could be serious and the visit this weekend could seriously launch Auburn into contention with Texas and LSU for the second-ranked prospect in the country, according to Rivals.
The other major recruit in attendance ($) was Fort Worth Dunbar wide receiver Darius White, currently the number one player in the state on the latest LSR and strong Longhorn lean. The speculation that he might commit at the Spring Game did not come to fruition, as White plans on taking visits with his teammates Rashad Favors and Dominique Sanders to Oklahoma and Texas Tech in the near future. The three teammates also visited Texas A&M the day before the Spring Game. It's not clear if White simply visiting the other schools to spend time with his friends and teammates or if he is seriously considering other schools. White still seems like a virtual lock to commit, but the visit to Oklahoma could help put the Sooners into serious contention. Stay tuned.
Nelson: no leader yet. Continuing to play his recruitment close to the vest, Skyline linebacker clarified remarks published by Inside Texas last weekend, saying that he has no clear leader ($), but that he is still very interested in the Longhorns. With his number offers sitting in the mid twenties, Nelson isn't in a hurry to end the process, choosing instead to carefully evaluate and consider each school. The fact that Nelson didn't make it down to the Spring Game after visiting Oklahoma the day before is not a bad sign for the Longhorns either, as Nelson's father is a minister and had to attend to his Sunday responsibilities.
Hicks working to narrow list. The Longhorns have long been a favorite of Jordan Hicks, but the Ohio native didn't mention Texas ($) during a brief interview with Rival's Buckeye site -- no particular surprise there, besides the fact that Hicks nearly always mentions Texas in interviews. Hicks may have an even more impressive offer list than Corey Nelson and is currently working on eliminating enough schools to reach a manageable number of seven to ten schools as he starts planning his summer visits.
Conventional wisdom on Hicks holds that it will be difficult to get him to leave the state of Ohio to attend college, leaving the Buckeyes as the possible favorite at this point after a visit last weekend that Hicks says went well, receiving personal from the Sweatervest himself. It will be a long process for Hicks and a visit to Austin in the summer will greatly increase the Longhorns' chances, but given that Hicks has already visited several times, the lack of a summer visit doesn't necessarily eliminate Texas.
McCoy, Terrell, and Adrian White attend NIKE Camp. For the committed members of the 2010 class, the spring and summer camp circuit isn't a time to be noticed, but it does provide observes a glimpse of the players' skill sets and provides another tool for evaluation. Case McCoy, Darius Terrell, and Adrian White all attended the Nike camp ($) last weekend on the campus of TCU, where IT's Jeff Howe was in attendance to evaluate the future Longhorns.
On Case McCoy:
Case will inevitably, be it fair or not, be compared to his brother Colt McCoy (it does not help that the two sound alike and have many of the same mannerisms). One thing that stands out about Case McCoy is that he is a legit 6-2 right now and looks bigger than his listed 175 pounds (he is around 185 right now). The two best aspects that he showed at the Elite 11 were his accuracy and his velocity, especially on the short and intermediate timing routes. He has an extremely quick release and he wastes little movement in his delivery. He did as a good of a job as any quarterback at the event at putting the ball right where it needed to be on the shorter curls and outs. His most impressive throws ware on the 10-15 yard outs throwing hard, tight spirals with pinpoint accuracy. During individual drills his athleticism really shows on rollout passes with his smooth movement and ability to maintain velocity and accuracy while throwing on the run. The only area where he still looks like he needs to improve is on the deep ball but overall McCoy was easily one of the best quarterbacks at the event.
The assessment of McCoy sounds consistent with prior knowledge of Colt's little brother, but Howe doesn't mention a common complaint about McCoy -- inconsistent mechanics. A master of improvisation throwing the football, McCoy does not consistently use the same arm slot, a fact that bothers some observers, but ultimately won't make a huge difference as long as he is accurate and avoids having passes batted down at the line of scrimmage.
On Darius Terrell:
The people that I talked to from some of the other ESPN sites, such as recruiting analyst JC Shurburtt, raved about Terrell all day on Sunday. The more I watch Terrell the more I am convinced that if he was 6-5 instead of 6-3 he would be a top 50 national prospect as a tight end because his skill set and his talent level are tremendous. Nonetheless Terrell showed outstanding body control and good hands in all of the drills and looks fluid when running through drills. When people talk about pass catchers with a power forward mentality, Terrell fits that bill because if the ball is in the air he will fight, claw and do everything in his power to come down with it and that was evident in the one-on-ones on Sunday. He is tremendously physical and the despite the fact that he doesn't have great speed he consistently beat faster and quicker defensive backs off of the line and down the field. He can adjust his body to the football while it is in the air and he did not drop any passes in the one-on-one drills when I saw him.
On Adrian White:
White makes a lot of things look easy during his workouts and did so on Sunday. When going through the drills he showed why college coaches love his potential because he can sink his hips and he is very smooth when backpedaling and turning and running to get to the ball. In the one-on-one drills White played the ball as good as I have ever seen him. It was almost like he was making an extra effort to at least get an arm up or a hand around and in front of the receiver. He is very physical with receivers and can really blanket guys within 10-15 yards of the line of scrimmage. The one thing that White showed some weakness in was breaking on the football when playing from behind the receiver but that tends to happen at events like this where defensive backs really do not want to give up the deep ball. White once again showed all of the tools that make him an elite defensive back prospect.
Commenter jc25 linked to ESPN's assessment of the Longhorn recruits at the camp, with the most notable comment being about the inconsistencies of Adrian White, a common theme in evaluations of the DeSoto star. Despite his talent, White likely won't be asked to contribute when stepping onto campus -- that isn't to say that his inconsistencies aren't a concern, but that he does have a significant amount of time to address those problems.
From the Land of Miscellany. With the 2010 class almost complete roughly 10 months from National Signing Day, the Texas coaching is already deep into its evaluations of the class of 2011, hosting many of the top sophomores in the state at the Spring Game. Some names to remember until I start ramping up 2011 coverage soon: Running backs Aaron Green, Malcolm Brown, and Bradley Marquez, quarterback David Ash, defensive ends Jaurmaria Rasco and Cedric Reed, and tackle Marcus Hutchins, just to name a few...After seeing Malcolm Brown at the Spring Game, he doesn't look his listed 6-1, more like 5-10 to 5-11 (still acceptable size for a running back), but the kid is built...2011 Cedar Park linebacker and potential target Chet Moss already picked up his first verbal offer ($) -- from June Jones and SMU...A note of apology to Princeton Collins and his family for comments made some time back unintentionally suggesting a poor work ethic by the star Westwood running back. To receive consideration from so many major college programs, it's clear that Collins has the work ethic to maximize his significant physical gifts -- to suggest otherwise on my part was irresponsible.