UCF Recruiting Notes

Looking at prospects that have recently been offered by UCF as well as will visit the Knights.

Author:
Brian Smith
Publish date:
Feb 25, 2022 7:39 AM EST

ORLANDO - The upcoming month of March will be a very important one for the UCF Football program. The NCAA will allow for prospects to take unofficial visits to college programs, and the Knights will be hosting prospects from multiple states. In accordance with that timing, UCF has been busy offering top recruits. Several of them will likely end up visiting UCF at some point this year, if not actually during March. To that end, a key point to start off.

March Visits Impact National Signing Day

UCF will host prospects throughout the month of March. If UCF can bring in roughly 10-15 top prospects (truly top-notch) during March, it’s going to pay dividends this next December. It’s the start of a really important relationship-building process.

The goal is to get players on campus multiple times for visits so that everyone gets to know each other and feel comfortable. “Comfort” might be the most important word in recruiting, and multiple visits lead to success as the following point denotes.

It’s proven that when any one program hosts a recruit multiple times, the rate of signing that prospect tends to significantly go up. Just something to think about, as UCF will also host more unofficial visits in June, as well as official visits that same month. Hopefully many of those players will be repeat visitors.

In short, prospects that visit UCF in March are going to be far more likely to end up in a UCF uniform down the line. Now onto a few notes about what’s going on with UCF.

The recruits the Knights are going after represent a mixture of players from Florida, Georgia and Alabama, very similar to this past recruiting class, as well as college transfers.

Alabama

There are so many ties to Alabama for the UCF staff that it’s inevitable for them to start landing a few high school players out of the Yellowhammer State. Here’s a good sign, as brothers with offers to numerous programs down South and beyond plan to head to see the UCF campus.

The older Faulk, Keldric, is a national top 200 player in the class of 2023 by just about anyone’s account. That’s despite playing in a small town in the southern area of Alabama and not close to any metropolitan areas. His younger brother, Jakaleb, might only be a 2025 prospect, but he’s already picking up recruiting steam as well.

Getting them both on campus during the month of March is great for the Knights. It’s also a microcosm of what the UCF staff wants to accomplish: build relationships with prospects during the early portion of the recruiting process that make a difference come National Signing Day. That’s also true closer to Orlando.

Polk County

As an extension of the Orlando area, Polk County is essential to UCF’s roster development. It’s something that’s going to be brought up continuously at Inside The Knights because there’s just so much talent near the greater Lakeland, Fla. area. It’s also good to see UCF offer the following prospect before he completely blows up.

Jaremiah Anglin, Jr. competed at a high level this past weekend during the Miami Under Armour Camp. Finding a player that’s 6’1” or taller and can play cornerback is a goal for most defensive coaching staffs, UCF included.

Anglin is turning into a national recruit. Let’s see if the Knights can get him on campus multiple times between now and the fall. Living just over an hour for the UCF campus in the southern section of Polk County, that’s an obtainable goal. In addition to UCF, he has offers from Florida State, Penn State, West Virginia, USF, South Carolina, Pittsburgh, Louisville, Cincinnati, Louisville, Indiana, Kentucky and Coastal Carolina to name just some of them.

In short, Anglin’s recruitment is getting heated. These are the types of battles that UCF needs to win as he’s so close.

OL Pride

UCF has a veteran and talented offensive line headed into 2022. That’s the good news. Like any program, however, those players move on. The Knights need to hit the proverbial home run with offensive line recruiting this year. The following player is absolutely one of UCF’s top targets.

After seeing Roderick Kearney at last year’s UCF camp, plus this past weekend during the Miami Under Armour Camp, there’s no question he’s an elite national prospect. Getting him away from traditional powers will not be easy, but that’s the aim as UCF already showed that it could do that within last year’s recruiting class, as well as with its first 2023 commitment of defensive end Kaven Call from Apopka (Fla.) High School. Call had an offer from Georgia before selecting the Knights.

Transfers

There’s no rhyme or reason, but one can be assured that UCF will still be hitting the Transfer Portal when it’s a good fit. That’s especially true when it’s a critical position like defensive end.

While something that seemingly comes up often, it’s also a fact that UCF already secured nine public commitments for the 2022 roster that are transfers from other college football programs. Will the Knights end up with 10, 12, maybe even 15 transfers before next season kicks off?

That’s plausible. As UCF Head Coach Gus Malzahn has stated several times, “The game has changed.”

Of course Coach Malzahn is correct because the Transfer Portal is being used quite a bit by many programs, even Georgia, Alabama, Ohio State, and Notre Dame have taken key transfers to bolster their own rosters, during the past year, despite often being at or near the top of the traditional high school recruiting rankings.

In short, UCF fans need to keep up to date with transfers like the young man above, Jordan Domineck, as it’s a way that UCF continues to bridge the talent gap between itself and some of the Power Five programs that it’s trying to compete with.

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