Looking at the 2021 recruiting class, Tennessee Vols fans should stop bragging and Georgia football fans need to stop panicking.
Georgia football’s 2021 recruiting class is as follows (all rankings via 247Sports)
5-star QB Brock Vandagriff: No. 2 QB, No. 12 overall
4-star OT Micah Morris: No. 9 OT, No. 61 overall
4-star ATH David Daniel: No. 4 ATH, No. 78 overall
4-star RB Lovasea Carroll: No. 7 RB, No. 117 overall
4-star SDE Jonathan Jefferson: No. 13 SDE, No. 145 overall
4-star WDE Elijah Jeudy: No. 10 WDE, No. 170 overall
3-star DT Marlin Dean: No. 28 DT, No. 447 overall
Right now, this is the nation’s 20th ranked class. Given the fact that Georgia has only seven commitments, being ranked No. 20 is just fine. It’s clear that Georgia is going for quality over quantity in this class, with its commits carrying an average rating of 94.52, which is third in the country.
For comparison purposes, Tennessee has the No. 2 class in the nation. But Jeremy Pruitt is certainly going for quantity in this class. With 23 verbals, Tennessee commits carry an average rating of 89.84. That’s the lowest in the top-five.
(Fun fact: Florida, which has the nation’s No. 7 ranked class, has an average rating of 87.41, which is the lowest in the top-10 and the second-lowest in the top-15).
Georgia commits, fans and coaches all know that Kirby Smart has plenty of time to work his magic and climb the rankings by the time the early signing period rolls around in December. Maybe enlisting a little help from current players and commits on Twitter is what it takes to expedite that process, which is something we’ve seen a lot of this month. 5-star quarterback commit Brock Vandagriff has led the surge, tweeting at a number of top players in the 2021 class recruiting them to Georgia.
It’s too early to start doing two things: Bragging and panicking.
Look at Alabama. Nick Saban currently has the nation’s No. 46 raked class for the 2021 cycle. Nobody thinks for a second that the Tide will finish outside of the top-five when all is said and done. There’s just too much time and too many elite players remaining.
And let’s stick with Tennessee for a moment. The No. 2 class is nice, but in the end I’d prefer a class of around 22 players filled with elite commits than a class consisting of 30+ players where a majority of them are three-stars.
Tennessee’s 23 commitments broken down by star rating:
- One 5-star
- Nine 4-stars
- Thirteen 3-stars
Georgia has plenty of highly ranked uncommitted recruits still on its board, not to mention the ones that Kirby will try to flip to UGA.
NEXT…Georgia’s top remaining targets in the 2021 class
