Rapid City Area Undercovered Athletes to Know

We focused our late morning on the Rapid City Area and the large chunk of 2028 differen makers and one 2027 that I felt grew a ton from our last rankings update. These are some Rapid City's undercovered yet promising athletes that I would say all have playing on Saturdays written all over them.    The now 6'3 240 pounder offensive tackle from Rapid City Stevens is one that I would love to see more tape out of in this 2028 class as the limited tape that is out there shows me what this young man can do for the Raiders offensive trenches headed into his junior season. He has active hands that seem to fly quickly with good pad-level into his blockers and amount of violence that is in those hands, drives defenders into the turf and Johnnie appears to know how to finish on top of his defender. He has great technique for the light reps that he shows off in my eyes.     The best 2028 prospect out of Rapid City in 11AAA quickly appears to be Rapid City Stevens linebacker [player_tooltip player_id='1597634' first='Bridger' last='Mez']. He's efficent with penetrating downhill slowing down the run game as Bridger does solid work feeding into the inside gaps. He's one that you can tell is a high motor linebacker that has great vision as it's rare to see Bridger have to shed much off his blocks to get to the point of attack. He's also one of the better 2028 linebackers in the Dakotas when it comes to pass coverage as he shows good ball-tracking ability and a physical presence when it comes to 1v1s scenarios. Bridger also shows off sideline to sideline capability which I like to see out of this incoming junior who is right now our LB1 in the SD 2028 class.     Brody is one that I feel has taken a massive step up from our last 2028 rankings update and will see the growth where he's ranked here shortly. He's grown a ton with his hand technique and gotten swifter getting off blocks with those hands. That efficency has translated with great timing when he gets off blocks as Brody persistently gets to the point of attack quickly and with great pursuit angles. The 6'4 180 pounder also I feel has position flexibility to move to the linebacker or EDGE position as he is a 2028 prospect that has some solid upside to grow in the coming years.       One of the most impressive 2028 defensive backs we found today out of Rapid City was on our watchlist from before the 2025 season but surely will get a bump in this next 2028 rankings update, Cooper is a sound ball-tracker for his age. The now 6'0 175 pounder, also has great vison that carries range as a defensie back that can stretch his coverage on all three levels of the field defensively. Cooper is also a sound route-runner that can break on his routes and get penty of seperation and boosts strong hands in higher traffic areas. As you can tell, St. Thomas More stays pretty stacked upcoming in the 2026 season.   <a href="https://x.com/Cooper_Sales_4" id="https://x.com/Cooper_Sales_4">TWITTER</a>     Noah sits in my top-tier for the best quarterbacks regardless of class in the Rapid City Area and if you want to see why, you surely need to watch his outing in the state championship victory last year. He's got the three level arm strength, but the strides he made in his sophomore season with his deep route accuracy and overall poise in the pocket are evident. You can also tell the chemistry he has with his wide receiving core and their routes as Noah is one of the most precise ball throwers this region has to offer regardless of class. Threw for 38 touchdowns as a sophomore and has two more years under his belt to grow even further in the Cavs offense.

We focused our late morning on the Rapid City Area and the large chunk of 2028 differen makers and one 2027 that I felt grew a ton from our last rankings update. These are some Rapid City's undercovered yet promising athletes that I would say all have playing on Saturdays written all over them.