The college football recruiting hot stove has been on full blast of late ahead of national signing day on Feb. 2. The Florida Gators under new head coach Billy Napier along with his army of coaches and staffers have been hitting the pavement hard in an effort to restore glory to the gridiron Gators.
While the focus has been primarily on recruits from the 2022 class, as the turnover between coaching regimes caused an already low-ranked crop to drop precipitously in the rankings, Napier is not so myopic that he is ignoring the future. Along with the high school seniors that will be visiting the university’s campus, there will also be members of the 2023 class present as well.
Among the high school juniors who are inked for their visit is On3 four-star defensive lineman Derrick LeBlanc, who announced on Wednesday that he will make his first in-person meeting with the staff on Jan. 23, according to Corey Bender of On3. This is not his first visit to Gainesville, however, as he attended a majority of Florida’s home games this past season after making several trips prior as well.
The 6-foot-5-inch, 250-pound in-state lineman from Kissimmee has several schools in mind so far in addition to Florida. The co-front runner for his services along with the Gators is Ohio State, while Clemson, Miami, Oklahoma, Penn State and UCF all are in the running as well.
Previously, former defensive line coach David Turner led the recruiting effort for Dan Mullen’s staff. Now, Napier, Patrick Toney and Jamar Chaney are all spearheading the effort to get him into an orange and blue uniform in 2023.
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