Tag: J.J. Kohl

Where did the top quarterbacks sign in the 2023 recruiting class?

Jackson Arnold to Oklahoma and Arch Manning to Texas, but where did the rest of the top quarterback sign to play college ball in 2023?

From the high school level to the NFL, quarterback play has become the greatest contributor to winning in the game of football. Teams can certainly win without great quarterback play, but they must have an elite defense and running game to do so.

So when a team lands one of the top quarterbacks in a recruiting class, it’s a big deal.

The Oklahoma Sooners have had their fair share of great quarterbacks over the last 20 years. Sooner quarterbacks have won four Heisman trophies and earned more trips to New York as a finalist as well.

In the 2023 cycle, the Sooners signed [autotag]Jackson Arnold[/autotag]. A four-star player at the time of his commitment last January, he has skyrocketed over the last 11 months. From earning Elite 11 MVP honors in the summer to becoming a consensus five-star player, Arnold’s stock has seen incredible growth. He backed that up with an incredible senior season, during which he accounted for 4,400 total yards and 57 touchdowns to help Denton Guyer reach the Texas 6A state semifinals.

He’s the highest-ranked player in the Oklahoma Sooners recruiting class, according to 247Sports. Arnold was the second-longest tenured commitment in the class before signing with Oklahoma on the first day of the early signing period. Pulling the No. 1 player in the state of Texas and the No. 7 player in the class is a huge win for [autotag]Brent Venables[/autotag] and [autotag]Jeff Lebby[/autotag].

Arnold’s addition helped ease the loss of Malachi Nelson, who flipped to USC to follow Lincoln Riley last December. Signing Arnold also helped the Sooners answer the Arch Manning signing by Texas.

There are a lot of good quarterbacks out there going to a lot of different places. Let’s take a look at where the top signal-callers landed.

Auburn’s next recruiting challenge? Flip a Big 12 commit

Auburn hopes to reel in a quarterback for the 2023 recruiting cycle. To do that, they may have to steal a prospect away from another program.

Auburn has extended an offer to 14 quarterbacks in the class of 2023 recruiting cycle. According to On3, 12 of those prospects have committed to a program.

Out of all the offers delivered, Auburn is currently the favorite to land one quarterback prospect, a three-star from West Palm Beach, Florida, [autotag]Will Prichard[/autotag]. Auburn has a 17 percent chance to land Prichard according to On3’s Recruiting Prediction Machine, with ECU slightly behind the Tigers at 15 percent.

The best chance for Auburn to land a talented quarterback is to attempt to pry him away from another program. That is what Auburn hopes to do with Iowa State commit [autotag]J.J. Kohl[/autotag].

Kohl, a four-star prospect from Ankeny, Iowa, received an offer from Auburn on August 10 despite having been an Iowa State pledge since April. In a recent interview with Caleb Jones of AuburnSports, a division of Rivals, Kohl remains strongly committed to the Cyclones.

“Under the current circumstances, if everything stays the same, I feel like I’ll end up at Iowa State,” Kohl said in an interview with Auburn Sports. “Overall, it has the best opportunity for me and I feel like it’s a really good fit for me.”

At the current moment, Kohl remains loyal to Matt Campbell and Iowa State, but he understands that the landscape of College Football recruiting changes constantly. Albeit small, the chance that Kohl could land at Auburn, or elsewhere, is still possible.

“We saw a lot of change in just the last offseason and crazy things can happen,” Kohl said. “If everything stays the same I’ll probably end up at Iowa State, but if things change, I might go out and seek different opportunities.”

Kohl is a four-star rated pro-style quarterback for the 2023 class. According to On3, he is the No. 2 quarterback in the state of Iowa and is ranked as the No. 10 overall quarterback for the class.

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Updated look at where the Sooners stand among Big 12 teams in 247Sports team recruiting rankings

The Oklahoma Sooners have had a fantastic month and a half since the calendar turned to June and have climbed just outside of the top 10.

The Oklahoma Sooners have added 11 commitments in the last month and a half to make a significant jump in the 247Sports composite team recruiting rankings.

They’ve made the biggest move up the rankings since June 30, landing commitments from four-star players like Cayden Green, Jaquaize Pettaway, Samuel Omosigho, Adepoju Adebawore, and Daylan Smothers. Add them to a recruiting class that includes five-star quarterback Jackson Arnold and four-star running back Kalib Hicks, and this group has a chance to improve even further beyond their No. 11 class in the country.

While the Texas Longhorns lead the way in the Big 12, the Sooners have closed the gap with their incredible couple of weeks in the month of July.

Let’s take a look at how the Big 12 stacks up in the latest team recruiting rankings from 247Sports.

Sooners 2023 commit Jackson Arnold among top performers at Elite 11 Finals

Competing against the top quarterbacks from across the country, Jackson Arnold was among the top performers at the Elite 11 finals per On3.

When Brent Venables and Jeff Lebby arrived, they hit the ground running on the recruiting trail, shoring up the 2022 recruiting class and getting started on 2023. The big get for the 2023 class was Jackson Arnold, who was the first new commit in the class of the Brent Venables era.

Arnold joined Joshua Bates, who had committed under Lincoln Riley, with the Sooners as they looked to rebuild the 2023 recruiting class. Though they may not have made as much of a splash as Texas lately, the dominos are steadily falling with commitments from Keyon Brown and Kalib Hicks on the offensive side of the ball in recent weeks.

Jackson Arnold, who helped Denton Guyer reach the Texas state championship game in his first season as a starter, has seen his status among 2023 quarterbacks grow over the last several months, recently earning his fifth star in the 247Sports composite rankings. And that status is being backed up this week at the Elite 11 Finals in Los Angeles where Arnold was considered one of the top performers of day one according to On3’s Charles Power.

Arnold was ranked second behind Iowa State commit J.J. Kohl, but here’s what Power had to say about Jackson Arnold’s day.

[autotag]Jackson Arnold[/autotag]‘s quick release and zip on the football was certainly among the best we saw on Tuesday evening. The ball jumps out of the Oklahoma commit’s hand. Arnold was a standout at a station that required the quarterbacks to roll out of the pocket and throw out-breaking routes across their body on the goal line. He also excelled in driving the ball to the boundary on high-difficulty throws. – Power, On3 Sports

Power continued:

The Denton (Texas) Guyer standout has a strong base that he uses to generate force on his passes. His power and quick throwing motion allow for a second life on some of his passes, with the ball continuing to pick up speed as it approaches the receiver. – Power, On3 Sports

Arnold has the ability to make all the throws you want him to on the football field. He does a great job combining arm strength, a quick release, and great accuracy.

While at the event, Jackson Arnold spent some time with Steve Wiltfong of 247Sports and had this to say about Oklahoma Sooners head coach Brent Venables.

“I love Coach Venables. He’s a super high-energy coach. I think he’s a great fit for Oklahoma and for what Oklahoma needs,” Arnold told Wiltfong. “And I absolutely love the family-like environment he’s creating too. He wants us to be not only great players but great people as well.”

He may not have garnered the same attention that an Arch Manning or Malachi Nelson has, yet, but by the end of his final season at Denton Guyer, he’ll be considered in the same light as the top quarterbacks in the 2023 recruiting class.

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