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A weekend visit from Ennis defensive end James Lockhart wasn't enough to convince the state's top prospect at the position to include the Texas Longhorns in his list of top schools on Monday:
Top 6. No order. Still opened to other schools and visits pic.twitter.com/Rm7RjsU4Eb
— James Lockhart IV (@James_Lockhart9) June 2, 2014
Talk about an absence of a post-visit bump, the typical surge in a recruitment that often accompanies a trip to campus.
The general consensus at this point is that Texas just didn't recruit Lockhart particularly hard recently, which seems to stand in stark contrast to the efforts of the Alabama coaching staff:
Just got off the phone with the whole Defensive coaching staff at Alabama. They compared me to Dont'a Hightower and C.J Mosley.. #blessed
— James Lockhart IV (@James_Lockhart9) June 3, 2014
A prospect could enough to play at Alabama would seem to be good enough to play at Texas, regardless of what the services think about him.
After all, Texas has only signed two defensive ends in the last two years and one of them may end up moving inside -- defensive end is a huge need in the class and the only current pledge is Rowlett's Charles Omenihu, increasingly a prospect who seems like an excellent take, but not enough himself to satisfy depth chart needs.
If there's any good news, it's that Lockhart still says that he's open to other schools and visits, as mentioned in his tweet, but how much does that really mean if the visit over the weekend didn't move the needle with him, as his list would indicate?
The lack of attention paid to Lockhart, who is basically like the upper middle class version of Solomon Thomas at the worst results in one of those recruiting situations that doesn't make sense, with the fact that Texas A&M managed to wait on offering him for months and months without having to suffer for it by landing on his list.
And it's not like Texas has gotten any other prospects offered on campus, though Strong and company would seem to stand a strong chance of landing junior college defensive end Tak McKinley, who has already scheduled an official visit. But that's only one player and the Horns could certainly justify taking two strong-side defensive ends in this class.
Nothing makes sense any more.