Want to attack every day with the latest Georgia football recruiting info? That’s what the Intel will bring at least five days a week. The play sheet for Wednesday calls for a preview of the massive official visit planned for this weekend with Trey Hill. Hill ranks as the nation’s No. 2 offensive guard prospect for 2018.
Trey Hill is a big man. His official visit to UGA will be this weekend. That, too, will be a very big one.
The Georgia staff will travel to see the near 6-foot-4, 340-pound player today in Houston County. That will be with both Sam Pittman and Kirby Smart.
Auburn plans an in-home visit with him on Thursday.
What does Georgia need to show him on this official visit? Does he need to see a super-sized cookie cake?
“Georgia doesn’t have to show me anything more really,” Hill said. “I’ve been to the school multiple times. It is the same thing. I am a top priority for them. They’ve been saying this to me since Day 1 so I really believe them.
“Georgia has been recruiting me as a top priority since my junior year.”
Do the Bulldogs still see him as a combo interior lineman?
“It is at guard slash center,” Hill said. “It is playing at guard at first and then see what happens at center. But it really doesn’t matter to me. Guard or center. Really doesn’t matter. It is the quickest way on the field for me.”
The U.S. Army All-American says he will sign on Dec. 20 and plans to enroll early at the school on his choice in January.
Those Tigers from Auburn sure hope it is in the SEC West.
The lure with Auburn for Trey Hill
Hill took his official visit to Auburn for The Iron Bowl.
“It was awesome, man,” Hill said. “Just seeing them get the win in the Iron Bowl versus Alabama was awesome. It was great to see. It was a great atmosphere there. Just seeing them win and how exciting it was was pretty great.”
That visit did not disappoint.
“It was all I wanted to see and a great atmosphere,” Hill said. “I don’t think that any recruit would want to miss that game. That would be the time of their life.”
For some reason, there has been a shifting of the winds with Hill in regards to recruiting momentum. He made a prediction for Auburn to win the first meeting between Auburn and Georgia.
That doesn’t mean he chose Auburn over Georgia that day. He was impressed by what he saw from Georgia in the SEC Championship Game rematch.
‘They came ready to play and whatnot,” he said. “The O-line dominated up front, and that’s where it all starts.”
Comparing Auburn and Georgia for Trey Hill
What’s the biggest selling point for Auburn with Trey Hill?
“Probably that they have got four seniors there and all four of them start on the O-line and that they are leaving,” Hill said.
What would be that pitch from Georgia?
“They are an up-and-coming program,” Hill said. ‘They are young and need more people on the O-line.”
Are there any differences between the two programs?
“Both of them are really the same to me,” he said. “Both of them are SEC schools. You get the same academics at both of them. There’s not really a lot of difference between the two schools.”
My take on that one is that’s probably the best way to look at his upcoming decision, too.
I’ve also got two links for everyone to pay attention to this week.
The DawgNation Big Board for UGA in 2018
Which UGA commits and targets now plan to sign early?
Getting everyone up to speed on the week
- Hill hopes to wear No. 55 in college. Several programs will have that number available to him, he said. Senior Dyshon Sims will be leaving that uniform behind in Athens. So that would be a possibility at Georgia.
- Hill’s official visit isn’t the only one on the books for this weekend. The officials for 4-star Texas wide receiver Tommy Bush and cornerback Divaad Wilson, a recent Florida de-commit, also are scheduled for this weekend. Wilson, it should be noted, is a teammate of 3-star UGA safety commit Rachad Wildgoose Jr. The 6-foot Wilson ranks as the nation’s No. 30 CB prospect for 2018.
- Micah Parsons, a 5-star Harrisburg (Pa.) defensive end, established long ago that he was going to take an official visit to UGA. According to a report from Adam Freidman of Rivals.com, that is now set for Dec. 15. It will be his last official prior to his planned signing during the early period on Dec. 20. I’d put a Coca-Cola down on Parsons choosing Penn State. But he did establish a good vibe with 5-star quarterback and Georgia commit Justin Fields when they were committed to the Nittany Lions for some time.
- An easy prediction: That Dec. 15 official visit window should go down as the most important for the class in 2018. A lot of the UGA commits have held off on their officials until that date. Five-star offensive tackle Cade Mays is scheduled to make his official visit during that same time frame. The same should be expected out of 4-star tight end target Luke Ford. I’m hearing rumblings about Ford now possibly making his decision during the early period. We discussed that on our Before the Hedges Facebook Live show on Monday night.
- Add another name to the tally of Georgia commits expected to sign early. Four-star outside linebacker Azeez Ojulari now is expected to sign during the early period. That means that 11 of the 18 commits plan to sign during Dec. 20-22. A few others are undecided.
- Ojulari will schedule surgery to repair his knee Wednesday. That procedure will be handled by the team doctors at UGA. Those doctors also recently performed knee surgery on 5-star running back commit Zamir White, who tore an ACL.
- Four-star DT Christian Barmore, a fast-rising 2018 prospect in every sense of the term, now plans to take his official visit to Alabama this weekend. He also plans an official visit to UGA on Jan. 12. DawgNation got word the Bulldogs were considered his top school as recently as a month ago. Barmore potentially could be another recruit from Philadelphia. The families of current Bulldogs Mark Webb Jr. and D’Andre Swift have no doubt continued to put in a good word about the big things that are taking place and are still up ahead for the UGA program.
Did you happen to notice?
There has been a gradual re-ranking of all the players in the class of 2018. Rivals.com reset the class earlier this week. Look for 247Sports to update its ratings on Wednesday.
When that happens, the 247Sports composite re-aligns to those new evaluations. Adam Anderson received his fifth star from Rivals and it boosted him to a 5-star recruit on the composite metric. The composite is generated by an algorithm and derives from the rankings of all the major services.
That, in turn, fuels the team ranking. The Bulldogs moved up to No. 4 nationally in the 247Sports team composite ranking. But the bigger headline was for the class of 2019 on that front.
Florida has had a few de-commitments from its 2019 class. That finally allowed the Bulldogs to move to the No. 1 sport for the class of 2019. The program likely will remain there when all of those major commitments for the class of 2019 have rolled in by this summer.
There were some ups and downs for other individual UGA commits along those rankings, too.
- Anderson, the new 5-star, is now the nation’s No. 1 OLB and the No. 22 player overall.
- Marist TE John FitzPatrick received his fourth star. He’s now the nation’s No. 9 tight end for 2019.
- Miami Central (Fla.) RB James Cook is only about four slots away from 5-star status. He’s at No. 32 overall.
- North Carolina DT Jordan Davis dipped to 3-star status. He now rates as the nation’s No. 29 DT prospect for 2018.
- Major UGA target Christian Barmore also saw his stock continue to rise. He was a 2-star prospect at the beginning of the year, then shifted his focus to the defensive line. When the first four games of his senior tape went out, he quickly picked up UGA, Alabama and LSU offers, among others. He now rates as the nation’s No. 16 prospect at DT for this cycle.
Miss any Intel? The DawgNation recruiting archive will get you up to speed faster than Georgia All-America candidate Roquan Smith can find the football after the snap.