NC State Football Recruiting Update – October 30, 2019

Recent Decommit: 3* WR Stephen Gosnell from East Surry HS (NC). Reportedly was thinking about decommitting for a while before doing it. He grew up a UNC fan. Not a huge loss in my opinion due to the level of competition East Surry plays (1A-2A at best). My nephew is from the area and says that Gosnell is fast, but will need to gain a ton of weight to be any kind of impact at the college level. More of a package deal for UNC, time will tell if he has any impact or not there.

New Commit: 3* WR Joshua Crabtree committed to State before Gosnell decommitted. Crabtree is a very big bodied receiver who will do well at State. Very good route runner and high points the ball well. He could definitely be an asset in the vertical passing game. He attended camp at State in June 2019 and the coaches kept in touch with him and after his senior year started with a bang, he earned an offer.

New Offers:

WR Devin Chandler (6’2″/185) – Attends Hough HS in Cornelius, NC. 4.59 40-yard dash at State’s camp last summer. He also had a 37.2″ vertical jump at State’s camp.

Rated a 2* WR on Rivals, NR on 247Sports and ESPN. Runs 11.4 100 meter dash also.

Senior Stats (so far): 8 games – 29 catches for 523 yards with 9 Touchdowns, 6 Kickoff Returns for 124 yards, 5 Punt Returns for 72 yards

Junior Stats: 9 games – 29 catches for 613 yards with 6 Touchdowns, 16 Kickoff Returns for 349 yards, 7 Punt Returns for 69 yards, 16 Tackles and 1 Interception on defense

Film Breakdown: Very tall and lanky receiver. Catches almost everything which comes his way, ran a lot of post and fly routes on film, also runs some jet sweep plays, long strider, will definitely need to gain some weight in a college weightlifting program to be able to make an impact at the college level. Very good hands and high points the ball extremely well. Intriguing prospect who does well against high level competition.  Reminds me a lot of cross between Josiah Provillon and CJ Riley on film.

Highlights:

RB Jovon Davis (6’0″/195) – Attends Bluefield HS in Bluefield, WV. HS teammates with Target 4* DE Sean Martin. Reported 4.5 40. Rated a 2* and the #3 overall player in West Virginia on Rivals, the #43 Running Back in the Country and #3 overall player in West Virginia (3*) on 247Sport, and the #71 Running Back in the Country  and the #2 player in West Virginia (3*) on ESPN.  Currently committed to Toledo (committed in July 2019).  Runs track also. 11.28 100 meter, 24.55 200 meter time. To put his 100 meter and 200 meter time in perspective – Zonovan Knight ran a 100 meter  in 11.64 and 200 meter in 23.24.  Coach Tony Gibson saw him play in person last Friday and State extended an offer within a day.

Film Breakdown: His film below shows that he runs very hard, bounces off a lot of contact, can make plays in the open field with his size and speed. Probably needs to work on his quick twitch and juking capabilities, but is definitely a physical back. His competition is not as high as the level of Ricky Person, but his highlights show me a level of physicality which reminds me a lot of Person. A large amount of the running plays they run in the highlight film remind of what we are trying to do this year (lots of zone reads and power plays to allow him to get the second level quickly).

Highlights:

New Preferred Walk-On Offers:

C Will Mitchell and QB Andrew Harvey from Cardinal Gibbons HS in Raleigh (Harvey is the son of Wolfpack QB Legend Terry Harvey), WR Whit Kane from Heritage HS in Wake Forest, NC, and ATH Amir Webster from Ravenscroft HS in Raleigh, NC, and WR Jashaun Patterson from WF Rolesville HS.

Keep an eye on WR Whit Kane from Heritage HS in NC. He might not get an official offer due to his size, but is definitely another playmaking WR in the mold of a Thayer Thomas who could do big things at State (Kane was invited to visit the Syracuse game on 10/10). Kane ran a reported 4.37 and 4.42 40 time at a camp at UNC Charlotte in the summer of 2019. Webster is another smaller, jitterbug kind of athlete who can make a lot of plays in the open field.

Bye Week Visits:

During the Bye Week, coaches fanned out all over the state and in other areas to watch recruits play. Coach Doeren and Coach Kitchings personally went to see 2021 5* RB Will Shipley at his game. Coach Garrison went to Georgia and saw Commit 4* OT Austin Blaske play. Coach Gibson went to West Virginia to see Sean Martin and Jovon Davis play. I have a feeling that we are going to start seeing some new offers now that senior seasons are about half over, highlight tapes are being edited and sent out, and our coaches have had time to hit the road to watch recruits in person.

Other Rumors:  OG Jonathan Adorno flipped his commitment from NC State to UNC last night. Look for the Wolfpack coaches to continue to ramp up the intensity on Target 4* OG RJ Adams who has publicly decommitted from Penn State and has stated that he will take 4 more official visits.

Commit DT Jaylen Smith was rumoring that he was looking around, but dispelled those rumors later in the same week and stated that he was 100% locked in for State.

Transfer Portal:

Former Pack Target LB Derek Boykins has decided to transfer from South Carolina. We were one of his top 4 schools when he was a senior in High School at Central Cabarrus. He finished the 2019 cycle rated the #39 Inside Linebacker in the Country (3*) on Rivals, the #14 Inside Linebacker in the Country (3*) on ESPN, and the #27 Outside Linebacker in the Country (4*) on 247Sports. He was an early enrollee at South Carolina and has not burned his redshirt, therefore he may be eligible to play right away at the college he selects to transfer to.

247 Sports Podcast Information:

PackPride on 247Sports put out a free Facebook Video podcast which contained a lot of updates about Football Recruiting. For those of you who don’t want to listen to all 20+ minutes of it, here is the essential information:

• 4 Blueshirts last year put a dent in the available scholarships for this year
• Commit WR Porter Rooks will probably start at the slot receiver position for State, therefore, making it so the remainder of NC State’s WR targets are going to be outside guys
• NC State isn’t taking as many guys in the 2020 class, mostly a “depth class” due to the extremely high amounts of talent in the 2018 and 2019 classes
• Coaches visited over 20 schools in the Triangle, Charlotte, Greensboro areas of North Carolina and went to schools in Georgia and West Virginia during the bye week
• State is probably done at the Defensive Line in this class unless DE Sean Martin decides to give State a serious look. They are also probably done at Offensive Line unless they add RJ Adams.
• Heavily Involved with a transfer Linebacker so the interest in Jayland Parker might be fading some (through some digging, I found out that was Derek Boykins)

Numbers, Numbers….

Since the 2015 cycle, 27 signed and committed recruits have left the program, which should be playing significant minutes now.

Let’s look at each class and see what could have happened:

2015: These guys would be redshirt seniors this season – 4* RB Johnny Frasier, 3* WR Freddie Simmons, 3* LB Riley Nicholson, 3* WR Brian Sessoms, 3* DT Quentez Johnson, 3* DE Emanuel Olenga, 2* OC TJ McCoy (went to Florida, now at Louisville)

2016: These guys would be redshirt juniors this season – 4* TE Thaddeus Moss, 3* CB James Valdez, 3* DT Shug Frazier, 3* DB JJ Givens, 2* CB Bryce Banks, 2* WR Daeshawn Stephens, 2* LB Garrett Hooker, 2* OT Bryce Folsom, 3* TE/ATH Bryce Dixon, 2* DE/OT Kendall Brown

2017: These guys would be redshirt sophomores this season – 4* WR Antoine Thompson, 3* TE Damien Darden, 3* LB Raven Saunders, 3* RB Nakia Robinson, 3* RB Erin Collins, 2* TE Adam Boselli, 2* DE Kevince Brown

2018: These guys would be redshirt freshmen this season – 3* OG Kahric Belle, 3* DE Davontae McCrae, 3* OT Jaylynn Strickland

Out of these 27:  3 Running Backs, 4 Wide Receivers, 5 Offensive Linemen, 4 Tight Ends, 5 Defensive Linemen, 3 Linebackers, 3 Defensive Secondary.  

16 out of the 27 have been from the offensive side of the ball (59%).  Defensively, with last year’s class, I think NC State was able to recover on the defensive side of the ball in regards to overall talent, but depth is still an issue. Offensively, with the 2018 class, the Wolfpack should have been able to recover on the offensive side of the ball in regards to overall talent, but depth is still an issue due to repetitive injuries. 

To put it in a different way, 31.7% of the high school scholarship players NC State has brought into the program since the 2015 class have transferred out or have not been able to medically stay in the program.

Conversely, they added the following transfers during this time:

2016 – 3* QB Ryan Finley, 2* K Carson Wise

2017 – 4* TE Cary Angeline, 2* DT Keenan Solomon

2018 – 4* QB Bailey Hockman, 3* CB Kishawn Miller, 3* DT Val Martin

2019 – 3* WR Tabari Hines, 3* DE Jeffrey Gunter, 4* LB Vi Jones, 3* P Mackenzie Morgan

Important to Note: The current staff has not developed a traditional High School recruited Quarterback since they have been here – the closest thing was Jalan McClendon, who was a part of the 2014 recruiting class (the current staff’s first recruiting class) – Career Numbers: 26 of 47 passing for 262 yards with 1 TD and 4 INTs, 46 rushes for 223 yards and 2 TDs in 36 games (Leary almost surpassed his total career passing yards in the last game at Boston College). I’m really hoping Leary can change this trend now that he has gotten the starting nod.