On Monday, Stephen Spiewak, an editor for MaxPreps, reported on Twitter that Aledo RB Johnathan Gray had informed him of his announcement date -- April 22nd, the talented running back's birthday. Later that night, James Gray told the recruiting services that after talking to his son, the announcement will likely happen on that day, although it does not appear to be confirmed at this point. Gray will decide between Texas, TCU, and Texas A&M.
It's still not clear whether Gray will make it to Austin again before deciding. The spring game is on Sunday, but the only scheduled trip at the moment is to College Station on Saturday to view a practice. Gray was in attendance at TCU on Saturday for the Horned Frogs scrimmage and has made several other recent trips to Fort Worth, which is only about 20 minutes away from Aledo.
The proximity of TCU has made it easy for the Grays to visit, but is there any deeper significance to those trips? The Horned Frogs do seem like serious competition for the Longhorns, widely considered the leader for some time.
The move to the Big East could have a major impact on recruiting for TCU -- no longer will the school find itself on the outside looking in at the BCS championship game with an undefeated season when matched against one-loss teams. In other words, the Longhorns are no longer the easy choice based on a desire to win national championships.
The take here though is that Texas losing a major recruit to TCU hasn't happened in recent memory and it would be an upset if it starts with Johnathan Gray, who has to decide whether he wants to be the guy at TCU or whether he wants to split carries at Texas, a move that would likely extend his NFL career.