Carolina Confidential – More on a busy recruiting week

Carolina Confidential – presented by Herring Insurance Services – is your home for South Carolina football and recruiting insight from Gamecock Central’s Wes Mitchell.

South Carolina has three big target announcements on deck for this weekend but there are plenty of additional situations to track this week as well.

— Greer (S.C.) Riverside class of 2025 four-star tight end Mikkel Skinner landed an offer from South Carolina last week and while he remains committed to Cincinnati, his recruitment appears far from over.

The 6-foot-3.5, 220-pound Skinner has been on a visit tour during the last week or so that saw him check out West Virginia, Kentucky, Cincinnati and South Carolina.

Cincinnati, led by Josh Stepp, has done a phenomenal job recruiting Skinner but is going to have to withstand pushes from Kentucky and South Carolina to hold onto the pass-catching tight end.

Interestingly enough, our friends over at KSR felt good about a flip to Kentucky leading into his visit there but that was before the Gamecocks offered.

It would probably be premature on my part to call this one for South Carolina but I’m told that Skinner has always liked the idea of playing for his home state, particularly for the Gamecocks, and Dowell Loggains has done a good job of staying in contact with Skinner even before the offer was sent out. Needless to say, we are keeping a close eye on this situation and if today’s visit goes as planned, he could quickly be trending towards playing in Columbia.

— South Carolina extended an offer to an intriguing junior college offensive tackle prospect in Copiah-Lincoln offensive tackle Ka’Marii Landers. A native of Dearborn, Mich., Landers originally signed with Akron out of high school and is a bounceback JUCO prospect with three years to play two. Interestingly enough, he actually would be able to enroll at a new school this August.

In addition to South Carolina, Landers has received offers in the last week from Arkansas, Houston, Baylor, and Utah State. He’s officially someone we’re tracking as a potential late addition to the Gamecocks’ 2024 class.

— In case you missed my note on The Insiders Forum, Snellville (Ga.) South Gwinnett three-star linebacker Jaiden Braker remains committed to South Carolina at this time but our read is that he’s trending away from the Gamecocks. There’s a lot of confidence on the LSU side that he’s headed there after his visit to Baton Rouge over the weekend and that’s my expectation too unless something completely changes again. As I said in the post, just mentally prepare yourself of that strong possibility.

— To put a bow on a couple of local recruitments, there hasn’t appeared be much mutual interest between South Carolina and Hammond tight end Mike Tyler for some time now and he’s considered a heavy LSU lean. Things have been hot and cold with the Gamecocks and Heathwood Hall CB Onis Konanbanny and he’s set to pick Tennessee or Florida State soon. Industry sentiment is that it’s likely to be UT but I haven’t dug much past that since it won’t be Carolina.

— A South Carolina-Maryland battle has emerged for Virginia Beach (Va.) Salme four-star interior offensive lineman Jaylen Gilchrist, who is set to announce on Saturday among finalists South Carolina, Maryland and Georgia.

We don’t believe that Gilchrist has informed either school of where he’s going at this time and while the Gamecocks have been considered a favorite, the Maryland push here is very real.

We don’t believe that his recruitment will be over even after the commitment on Saturday and it feels like both schools will be jockeying for “final” position leading into the announcement.

— The mutual interest between Franklin (Tex.) class of 2025 three-star running back Jayden Jackson and South Carolina continues to grow after he had a great visit to Columbia for the cookout on Friday.

Jackson has a long-standing relationship with Marquel Blackwell dating back to when Blackwell as at Texas A&M and Jackson told us that he got a family feel at the cookout and that it felt like a family reunion.

The 6-foot, 220-pounder is currently planning to be back in Columbia on the weekend of Oct. 4, when Carolina play Ole Miss, in what will likely be his official visit to the school.

We’d currently consider him to the most likely running back to be in the Gamecocks class.

——————————

Today’s Carolina Confidential is brought to you by Herring Insurance Services. Call, email, or PM Gamecock Central member and avid South Carolina football fan Brent Herring today to discuss your home and auto insurance needs.

Located in Lexington but serving all of the Carolinas
803-356-0763
Brent@BrentHerring.com

Discuss South Carolina football on The Insiders Forum!

The post Carolina Confidential – More on a busy recruiting week appeared first on On3.