Arizona football recruiting: Wildcat commits receive boosts in rankings

Many commits were rewarded in recruiting rankings after strong performances

For the longest time, many of the Arizona Wildcats’ commits weren’t ranked by all four major recruiting services. The 247Sports composite score grabs from 247Sports, ESPN, Rivals, and Scout, balancing all four rankings into one.

It appears as if quite a few recruiting services have finally started ranking guys after their senior season. There are many flaws in recruiting rankings, and you can see it when Rhett Rodriguez, Xavier Bell, Elijah Watson, Edgar Burrola, Kylan Wilborn, and Matt Leo committed. All were unranked prior to their commitment to Arizona, but suddenly jumped to 3-star status within a matter of days.

But now, with most of the recruits finishing their senior seasons, services have been re-ranking the appropriate recruits, and 247Sports came out with updates that many of Arizona’s commits benefited from.

The class of 26 commitments is currently the No. 20 class in the nation. I’d expect Arizona to stay within the 20-28 range by National Signing Day with a few key additions and more finalized rankings.

Arizona legacy commit Jalen Harris received quite a big jump in this update. He was previously ranked 527th in the nation and is now at 475th. He’s a guy that had four-star potential and the staff loves what they have in Harris. He’ll be coming in as a hybrid outside linebacker.

Despite not playing this season, it seems like Malik Hausman received a nice bump. Ranked inside the top 1000 all throughout the summer, he’s now inside the top 750 overall. He’s been recovering from an ACL injury he suffered on an Arizona visit after getting hit by a car.

Rhedi Short was once a top-500 safety when he was committed to UCLA. He dropped a bit after his decommitment to the low 800s and now sits just outside the top 600. The Cathedral secondary is one of the best in the nation and I get a feeling that Short is a guy that a lot of schools will try to poach when it comes to the big National Signing Day push after the dead period in December.

Probably one of my top three commits of this class, Scott Young, was barely a top 900 safety when he first came onto the recruiting service scene. Now, 247Sports has him just outside the top 500 overall.

Edgar Burrola has been rising since he committed to Arizona. He was previously unranked, then received two-stars soon thereafter. He picked up an offer from Louisville this summer after attending a satellite camp. He was once ranked just inside the top 1500, now he’s 950th. He suffered a shoulder injury which required surgery and held him out for the second half of his season. Desert Pines High went on to win the Nevada 3A State Championship.

Xavier Bell received one of the bigger boosts in the class. He had only been ranked by 247Sports, but now it looks like ESPN, Rivals, and Scout have jumped on board. Bell reminds me of Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles, and being one of the lead safeties for the No. 3 ranked team in the nation, I’d expect Bell to continue to rise.

Bell’s teammate at Mater Dei, Austin Faoliu, had been ranked outside the top 2000 in the nation, which is odd to begin with given his role on the No. 3 team in the nation. He’s going to give Arizona the size they need on the defensive line at 6-foot-3, 285 pounds.

Some guys who I still expect to continue climbing the rankings: Bryce Brand, Brian Casteel, and Troy Young.

Brand had a great season after transferring from IMG Academy to Clayton Valley. Casteel had a breakout year at Charter Oak playing wide receiver and running back. And then Young is a running back/safety out of Mobile Christian that has a lower ranking simply because of the size of his school in a much lower division in Alabama.

Delshawn Phillips is still only ranked by 247Sports, but given his junior college season, he should be a guy that sees a very healthy jump. He’s been one of the most productive junior college linebackers in the nation at Garden City, which will be playing Arizona Western for the NJCAA Championship.

It should be noted that Arizona’s highest ranked recruit, Greg Johnson, has been falling ever since his commitment to the staff and that’s not a coincidence. So many times there is bias with a recruit when it comes to his offers and where he commits. Had Johnson committed to USC, he would still likely be a top 60 recruit. Now he’s just outside the top 100, but is still the No. 1 athlete in the nation.

You can check out the entirety of the class and their rankings below:

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