3-star OL Zach Shackelford flips to the Texas Longhorns

The Texas Longhorns now have a fourth member of the 2016 offensive line class when Belton offensive lineman Zach Shackelford flipped to the Horns from the Kansas State Wildcats:

I will be headed south on I-35 tmrw morning! pic.twitter.com/TiGFdRMd2M

— SHACK (@shackattack1997) January 17, 2016

The 6'3, 290-pounder will now enroll in Austin for the spring semester after taking an official visit to Austin this weekend and hosting both coaching staffs on in-home visits late last week.

Committed to Kansas State since July, the 6'3, 290-pounder picked up his big offer from Texas after a lengthy evaluation process by the staff that finally culminated in early November. The offer prompted two unofficial visits from Shackelford during November prior to his official visit to Manhattan just before the dead period began. From that point forward, the momentum swung in Texas' favor, and the consensus expectations were for Shackelford to ride with Strong and the Longhorns.

Shackelford had a difficult decision to make -- remain loyal to the program that does an impressive job in instilling those feelings in committed prospects or stay closer to home and play for a school that was more skeptical about his ability for a much longer period of time. Clearly, the latter won out.

Ranked as the No. 1205 player nationally, the No. 61 offensive guard, and the No. 139 player in Texas, according to the 247Sports Composite rankings, Shackelford picked up more than 15 offers during his recruitment, including invitations to play at Arizona State, Cincinnati, Colorado, Houston, Illinois, Iowa State, Oklahoma State, Purdue, and Tulsa.

The last offer mentioned there was an important one since it was the former stop of new offensive line coach/running game coordinator Matt Mattox, who continued Shackelford's recruitment since arriving in Austin roughly one month ago. Now he's secured the commitment from Shackelford that he was unable land originally, with the help of the state's flagship university behind him.

Texas now has 14 pledges in a class that ranks No. 32 nationally and No. 4 in the Big 12, according to the 247Sports Composite team rankings.