In a season riddled with disappointment, the Virginia football team finally received some encouraging news Monday. In spite of the Cavaliers’ 2-8 record and seven-game losing streak, five-star defensive tackle Andrew Brown from Oscar Smith High School will be coming to Charlottesville early. Brown is regarded as the top defensive tackle by most, if not all, recruiting services and ESPN has him ranked as the No. 4 overall recruit for the incoming class.
“Andrew is a dynamic player on the defensive side [so] he’s the No. 1 defensive tackle in the country,” coach Mike London said. “I know that his ability, his accomplishments, his work ethic, I mean, there’s so many different things about him that he brings to the table that makes your football team a better team.”
Brown signed a grant-in-aid, which allows him to enroll at the University early and practice with the team in the spring. In doing so, Brown turned down offers from some of the most storied football programs in the history of college football including Alabama, Auburn, Penn State, Ohio State and the University of Southern California. In fact, since the BCS National Championship has existed, 11 different schools have won the national championship and only one — Oklahoma — did not offer Brown a scholarship.
For the Cavaliers, Brown’s commitment serves to strengthen the foundation of this young team as they look to rebuild during the offseason.
“We haven’t had the season that we planned to have this year,” freshman linebacker Zach Bradshaw said. “We have a really good recruiting class with my group of guys, and then this recruiting class coming up too, I know there’s a lot of big name prospects.”
Brown will likely be joined by Quin Blanding of Bayside High School. Blanding is the top safety recruit in the country and has signed a letter of intent to come to Virginia. Both Bayside and Oscar Smith are on the Chesapeake coast, which has turned into somewhat of a farm system for Virginia in recent years.
Starters such as junior cornerback Demetrious Nicholson, freshman running back Taquan Mizzell, and sophomore defensive end Eli Harold have all come from that area. The connection of the players from their high school days has played a large part in retaining the commitment of many of these star recruits even in the midst of the tumultuous season.
“[Brown is] a young man that made a commitment, his family made the commitment and has been on the inside of the program,” London said. “Players always talk to other players, and that’s the significance of any program — of any recruiting, of gathering and gaining talent — is the players that are there.”
In addition to Brown and Blanding, Virginia has commitments from five four-star players. For the players on the team currently, understanding what the incoming recruiting class brings to the table in terms of talent is important given the impact the freshman players have had this season.
“I try to follow recruiting as closely as possible, because those are the guys that will be playing with me in the next couple of years,” sophomore quarterback David Watford said. “You’ve got to find out about those guys — what they’re good at, what they have to work on and what we can help them with, and just furthering their development as players.”
Watford says he makes sure that recruits understand what they are undertaking in coming to Virginia.
“When I meet a recruit, I just try to be honest with them, and just try to be real,” Watford said. “I don’t try to sugarcoat anything or make anything up about stuff that’s going to happen or what they’re going to go through. I just try to be as honest and as real with those guys as I possibly can.”
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