June Recruiting Update: Part 1 (Defense)

Just over a week into perhaps the busiest recruiting month on record after the end of the longest NCAA dead period in Division 1 college football history, players across the state are hitting camps all over the country. The return of in-person evaluations has led to an uptick in offers and recruiting interest. Here, we’ll break down some of those new developments on the recruiting trail. In this installment, we’re focused on the defensive players taking visits and earning offers. <strong>Top Guys Taking Their Visits</strong> For a lot of the guys more advanced in their recruitment, June has presented the opportunity to visit some of the schools that have offered. Several players have been busy already this month, including West Brunswick linebacker <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="28677" first="Carter" last="Wyatt"]</strong>, who has visited ECU, NC State and South Carolina unofficially and Duke officially. He has plans to see Syracuse and Georgia Tech officially later this month. It’s not a bad visit schedule for a guy that started the spring season with no offers, especially now that he holds nearly 20 offers. New Bern 2023 defensive tackle <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="44971" first="KJ" last="Sampson"] </strong>has long been near the top of our rankings and he’s catching the attention of several top schools. So far, he’s visited Georgia, ECU and Duke and met with Prep Redzone to give us a little more on each of those visits. "Georgia was a really good experience," Sampson told us. "They really set the bar high and they showed me great hospitality. Their facilities were really good." On ECU: "ECU was a good visit. It was good to get to sit down and talk to (head coach Mike) Houston." Sampson also told us that he was able to spend some time with several coaches at Duke, including head coach David Cutcliffe. He currently holds verbal offers from each of those schools and several others. Sampson has plans to visit Ohio State Wednesday and North Carolina Saturday. He’ll finish out the month with 2-day visits to South Carolina and Alabama before seeing Coastal Carolina in July. https://twitter.com/ksampson94/status/1401259314602520577?s=20 Shelby 2022 defensive tackle <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="28638" first="Santana" last="Hopper"]</strong> took a trip to Boone to visit App State, and the visit seemed to go well, as he earned a scholarship offer. Hopper has several Power Five offers but hasn’t visited many schools yet this summer. <strong>New Scholarship Offers Going Out</strong> In addition to a lot of the top players in the state, there’s a second group of players earning scholarship offers that may not get the accolades. West Craven defensive tackle <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="97534" first="CJ" last="Mims"] </strong>is a guy I think could end up at the Power Five level. For now, he’s on a roll with Group of Five offers, as East Carolina stepped in with an offer after a visit. This came a week after Georgia State offered. After visiting and working out in Lynchburg, Reagan edge rusher <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="154613" first="Semaj" last="Turner"] </strong>was offered by Liberty. It’s his first Division 1 offer and more could come as he makes his rounds this summer. Hough defensive back <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="149211" first="Ethan" last="Johnson"]</strong> has seen his recruitment catch fire in the weeks since the season ended, picking up a flurry of scholarship offers from FCS and Group of Five schools. He’s a guy that I think has the talent to excel at the high Group of Five or even Power Five level, if given the chance. Fellow 2022 defensive back <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="154642" first="Zamari" last="Stevenson"] </strong>of Statesville picked up his first FCS offer from Elon on June 4, then picked up a Wake Forest offer a few hours later after a workout. He’s gaining momentum. We’ll have several of these updates throughout the summer. Make sure to tag us in workouts, visit updates and scholarship offers on Twitter, <a href="https://twitter.com/PrepRedzoneNC">@PrepRedzoneNC</a>.