Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Arizona football recruiting: End-of-season highlights, Kapri Doucet interview and Josh Allen update

A whole lot of recruiting news heading into the new year

We're still in the "dead period" of recruiting, but there's still plenty going on with Arizona Wildcats commits, and some potential commits for this class and next. Quite a few end-of-season updates, with a lot of good news. Just a few more weeks and it's signing day, and we'll know exactly where Rich Rodriguez' recruiting class stands.

Kapri Doucet talks Arizona visit

The No. 10 ranked JUCO linebacker in the nation was in town earlier in December, and he was a fan. "Man I love it out there. The whole thing. Everything. There was nothing I didn't like about it," he said about his visit.

But being such a highly-ranked junior college linebacker, he's been picking up more attention now than ever.

"Coaches are starting to hit me up now. A lot of coaches want visits now; I'm just going to take my visits and make my decision," he said. Nebraska, TCU, Oklahoma, Iowa State, Arkansas are all swarming his inbox, hoping he gives them a closer look as we approach signing day, when Doucet anticipates on committing.

When it comes to his decision process, it comes down to two factors.

"Academics and playing time, because I only have two years and a redshirt. So coming in to start is a big factor for me. Playing right away. A place where coaches take care of their players, and they do that at Arizona, so those are some major factors," he explained.

One thing that might give Arizona an advantage when it comes to his recruitment, is the Pac-12 conference. Arizona is currently the only Pac-12 school recruiting him, and he seems to think highly of the league.

"It's a great conference," Doucet said of the Pac-12. "Playing in the Pac-12 would give me the opportunity to show what I can do as far as blitzing, because it's a passing conference. It gives me the opportuntiy to show that I can blitz. I can also play in the box and I can also cover. So it gives me a chance to show all of my abilities as a football player."

As far as his role in the defense is concerned, he's already talked with coaches about where he can fit in, and what his role can develop into.

"Yeah I talked to Coach Casteel about that," Doucet continued. "We sat down for a little bit and talked about what they run, what they do and the concepts of the 3-3-5 and how they like to do things. I like what I can do in that defense and the role I would be playing and just different types of things I can be doing at the linebacker position."

London Iakopo releases LBCC career highlights

Arizona will be getting some big time help in the secondary, bringing in Long Beach City College safety London Iakopo.

Iakopo seems to be flirting a bit with Louisville, and will likely be heading out there soon. A bit odd considering the timing, but I'm not concerned at all about his stance with Arizona.

Former Arizona commit down to Arizona and Washington State

It seems as if Josh JJ Allen narrowed it down to Arizona and Washington State, and will visit both schools in January. Arizona on the 15th, Washington State on the 22nd.

I said a few weeks ago on a recruiting roundup that I felt very confident Arizona would end up landing Allen once again. A few weeks later and it still holds up. I would be shocked if Allen came out of that visit to Pullman and committed to Mike Leach.

It's unfortunate, because had he stuck with Arizona from the beginning, he would have enrolled early. Due to his indecision, he set himself back, and will not join the team until he completes his sophomore year at Long Beach City College.

But fear no more, as Arizona will gain an immediate pass rusher on defense, who will be penciled in as a starter. That would give Arizona four 4-star prospects for the class, and could potentially finish the year with a top 30 recruiting class if all goes well. But ignore the recruiting rankings as well, because while this class is still landing some higher-ranked 3-star guys, these recruits should fit seamlessly in the system on both sides of the ball. It's not so much the stars and rankings that is important with this class; it's the fit in the program.

Antonio Parks excited about Coach Addale

With the news of David Lockwood not returning to the staff, Coach Jahmile Addae, his successor, didn't waste much time to check up on his players and incoming recruits. Among those was Antonio Parks.

Parks told me he was on the phone with Coach Addae for about two hours, really getting to know each other, talking about the opportunity at hand. I would expect Antonio Parks to start at some point next season.

Kee Wheztel includes Arizona in top five

Arizona is in the hunt for a 2-star athlete, likely ending up at the receiver position. He's a 6-3 190lb target that has Arizona in his final five.

He'll be visiting Tucson on January 29th, and you could probably expect this to be a signing day decision. I scheduled a phone call with him soon, and will get more information.

Stanford's recruiting pitch is pretty swell

Stanford has stolen a few recruits from Arizona, and if this doesn't turn you onto Stanford, I'm not sure anything will.

Justin Holt named All-Arizona Division II first team defense

Good and bad news here for Arizona. Good because Arizona's 6-3 300lb defensive tackle commit was named first team All-Arizona for Division II. He finished the season with 79 tackles and 4.5 sacks through 10 games this season. Bad news, he's still going to be recovering from a broken fibula, and will be out for some time. I broke down his film a few weeks ago.

Sean Riley leads Narbonne to CIF State Championship

Sean Riley is a player in this recruiting class that I'm very excited for, and seems to be overshadowed by JJ Taylor. Riley led his Narbonne High School Gauchos to a CIF State Championship win, finishing the day with 16 rushes for 98 yards and two touchdowns.

Arizona commit DeVaughn Cooper is also a part of Narbonne, but I could not find any stats on his night. Back to Sean Riley, he also released his senior season highlights on Hudl soon thereafter.

2017 3-star corner Jalen Cole could be receiving an offer soon

I got a chance to talk to a potential Arizona recruit in Jalen Cole. He seems to be pretty excited about Arizona, and this could work out.



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