This Sentell’s Intel rep on Georgia football recruiting has the latest with 4-star North Carolina OL Ekene Ogboko. He ranks as the nation’s No. 3 IOL and the No. 36 overall prospect for 2026 on the 247Sports Composite. The On3 Industry Ranking has him as the No. 7 OT and No. 77 overall.
Ekene [pronounced as Eh-Kah-Nay] Ogboko has been a name to know for Georgia’s 2026 board for a couple of years now.
He was back at Georgia for his second consecutive G-Day last weekend. He’s the younger brother of redshirt freshman DT Nnamdi Ogboko. A conservative estimate would be that he’s been to UGA at least 10 times.
“I don’t even really know,” he said. “I can’t tell you the answer. It might be in double digits. It might be in single digits.”
It might be more than that. Counting the times he’s been up for his brother’s unofficial visits, his OVs, and all the scrimmages. He’s also been on several of his own unofficial visits to the facility, to games, and prospect camps.
There’s a familiarity there, but that didn’t stop Georgia coach Kirby Smart from not taking that for granted after G-Day. Ogboko told DawgNation he was the first recruit Smart met with after G-Day. There were a lot of options, but the 6-foot-6-plus, 305-pound Ogboko got that first slot.
“They actually told me that,” Ogboko said. “To show that I am a priority for them. They really need me there, and they told me that I would be the first one talking to Kirby.”
How did that chat go?
“It was a good talk,” Ekene Ogboko said. “We talked about Nnamdi a little bit and how he played, and just him and how he’s doing. Then we just talked about me and how he sees me as a priority at Georgia and how I can fit in to play there.”
How did he feel after his latest visit?
“This visit left me feeling good, man,” Ogboko said. “I liked it overall. My sister, my Mom, and Nnamdi’s [high school] D-line coach went down there. It was a good visit for us. We had fun. Got to see my brother. Talk to him after the game. It was a good visit after all. Got to see him play. It was a nice visit for us.”
While he’s rated as an IOL by 247Sports, he’s seen as an OT by On3.com. The more important distinction here is that the University of Georgia has been recruiting him to play tackle.
“They like just my length,” he said. “My versatility. My ability to bend. They like that a lot, too. Just my footwork. I think Georgia sees me as a tackle. They are telling me there are a lot of big guys, but they think with my versatility, my movement, my bend, and my feet, that I could play at tackle for them. With the starting right tackle and left tackle about to leave next year, maybe I can come in. They’ve said I will be competing with guys who haven’t started or played tackle in a game scenario before. I will be competing with those guys and have an opportunity to go start at tackle if I really wanted to.”
What sort of impression has veteran offensive line coach Stacy Searels made here?
“I think he’s a good guy,” Ogboko said. “I like him a lot. I think he has a resume of some of the guys he has developed in the past. I’m just saying he’s a good coach in general. I’ve known him for a while now, so we’ve built a relationship there already.”
Check out his junior film below:
Ekene Ogboko: Who are the contenders here?
Ogboko is looking for a specific set of criteria with his college fit. It was pretty impressive how he was able to articulate it all. It was a comprehensive yet logical guideline.
“I always say this,” he said. “The first thing I’m looking for is development. The coach-player relationship. Can I trust my coach? Can he trust me to do my job? Can I trust him to do his job and help me develop into a first-round pick? I need to really trust my coach to develop me and get me to go where I need to go.”
His second benchmark is very clear.
“I would say academics,” he said. “My Mom is a teacher, so we’re big on academics. Everything needs to come to a point where the academics are good for us.”
From there, it becomes increasingly difficult for all but a few select programs to stay in the running.
“I would say a school with a winning culture,” he said. “A school that wants to go win. The talent to win a national championship every year. Or at least they’re talking about it every year. They are going to compete out there like they are going for a national championship. I love that right there for me. With everything around me, I want to have a winning culture around me.”
The last thing will check the off-the-field box.
“A place that I can just vibe in,” he said. “I can see my personality fitting in and a place where I can go there and even when we are not playing games I can see myself on the off days still enjoying and having a good time there. You know what I am saying? A place where I can enjoy myself, be myself, and not have to change.”
How does Georgia check all those boxes?
“They meet almost all of them, I would probably say,” he said. “Just with the academics they have there. The development they do at the offensive line position. The winning culture they have, and just a place that I can fit in at.”
What are the other schools that have his attention?
“Clemson, Ohio State, LSU, and Notre Dame right now,” he said. “I would probably say Alabama, too, and South Carolina.”
Some of those official visit dates are mapped out. He has released four OV dates, but he now plans to take at least five officials, if not more.
Those will begin with the Clemson Tigers on the weekend of May 30 and take up the month of June.
“Right now, it is probably going to be Clemson that first week,” he said. “Georgia, the second week. Ohio State is in that third week. Then that fourth week will be Notre Dame, and that last weekend in June will be LSU.”
He might do another official visit, but he’s not sure. Ogboko also said he has no other unofficial visits planned at this time. Spring practice starts up at South Garner the first week of May.
Does his brother at UGA help or hurt the Dawgs?
Nnamdi Ogboko, his older brother, is thriving in his second season at UGA. He’s in line for some solid playing time this fall at the DT or NT spot.
Anyone who has had an older brother would understand that most younger siblings aren’t necessarily stoked to follow their college path. They usually want to blaze their own trail, but it is different here.
Ogboko wants to be a first-round draft pick one day. His older brother just happened to choose a program that develops those, as well as anywhere else in college football these days.
That’s all viewed differently by Ogboko and his circle.
It would be nice to play with his brother because he loves him, but that’s not the biggest draw for the Dawgs here. The real pull is that there will be no surprises. Other schools might promise this and that while recruiting him, but there’s real authenticity to the pitch from Georgia.
Would the total familiarity with the program be the biggest plus for UGA from that relationship?
“It definitely gives some intel on the school,” Ekene Ogboko said. “He’s already there. He’s been through the process, and we’ve seen everything. It definitely gives us the intel on the school, but there are some other schools we like and we want to explore our options, but I would definitely say, like you said, there’s probably no surprises because we’ve already seen how things went for Nnamdi his first year, and his second year. Stuff like that. We’ve just seen the process for him, and I will just follow that and keep going with that, but that’s really it.”
This is an interesting year for Georgia with legacy siblings. The Ogbokos are just one of the three sets of brothers that have a chance to follow their older sibling at UGA. Jared Wilson and his half-brother, PJ Dean, are the only duo that wouldn’t have the chance to play together in Athens.
Junior TE Lawson Luckie also has the chance to play one season with his younger brother. If 4-star Norcross DL Carter Luckie signs with the Dawgs, that would be a very rare thing. To think that could also happen with the Ogbokos at the same time is unprecedented in the modern era of UGA football history.
There have been brothers on the UGA team before, but not three brother legacies joining the team in the same recruiting class, with two of them getting the chance to play alongside their older sibling.
Scouting Ekene Ogboko: What does he bring to the field?
The Ogboko family hails from Nigeria.
While some of his teammates call him “Big E” and others call him Ekene, the meaning of his name is intriguing.
“Thanks to God,” he said. “My full first name is actually Ekene Dichukwu, so that means thanks to God, but I just go by Ekene.”
He thinks that’s the way it is spelled. It doesn’t show up on his high school transcript or his school ID.
Greg Greene, his head coach at South Garner HS in North Carolina, shared a thorough scouting report on all things Ogboko. Here’s the rundown of all the additional Intel we learned from both Green and Ogboko.
- Ogboko has put on about 20 pounds since the end of his junior season. He was measured at 6 feet, 6.25 inches at Georgia.
- Most of the recruiters have told Greene he’s a tackle, but many programs have recognized his ability to slide up and down the line. Ekene sees that as well. He’s even moved inside to play guard on the goal line to give the run game a little more push.
- His length is what keeps the position projection at tackle. He’s been measured with an 84.5-inch wingspan, and his single-arm reach has been right at 34.5 to 35 inches. His hand measured at 10.5 inches.
- Coaching stability is big. “As close as the same faces over the course of his college tenure is what we are trying to shoot for with him,” Greene said. “We know he’s athletic. We know his God-given attributes, but we also know he’s only been playing football for as long as he’s been in high school.”
- Greene downplayed the fact that his brother is already at UGA as having a significant bearing on his decision. “I think we, as coaches and his Mom, we all love everything Georgia has to offer,” Greene said. “Coach Smart has done a really good job of creating a destination for everything I’ve mentioned as a key piece of his decision can be found there.”
- “I think the biggest thing is making sure that Georgia has to recruit him,” Greene said. “It can’t be ‘Hey Nnamdi get him here’ because getting Nnamdi to push that needle for them, that is not going to work. One thing about Ekene individually is that he’s the baby brother. So he’s the baby in general. He’s the youngest. There’s a sense of ‘What is mine is mine. I want to earn mine. I don’t want anything off the coattails of my brother, my two sisters, or even my mom.’ He wants his own, and he’s worked hard to build that for himself.”
- A school putting a lot of draft picks into the NFL won’t be enough here. He’s going to be looking at that specific O-line coach and seeing how many guys he’s put into the league at various stops.
- Ogboko didn’t start playing football until his freshman year. That was after coming over from the basketball court. He got some great advice from the coaches in his circle that his professional future was on the field. Not on the court.
- The best play in his career likely came in his sophomore season. That’s when he pancaked his assignment to the other sideline and ended up doing a front flip over him. “When I pancaked him, I fell like over the top of him,” Ogboko said. “I did like a front flip over him and I put him in the ground.”
- It is the first play in the highlight below.
- Physicality and contact drive Ogboko. He wants to batter the man in front of him. His goal is to always be the most physical player on the field.
- He’s not wired the same as his older brother. He’s the baby of the family and more emotional. His brother is more chill and laid-back. It is hard to get a rise out of Nnamdi. He’s more stoic. Ekene is going to cut up more and have more fun.
- “The way that he is a sponge,” Greene said when asked about his favorite story on Ekene. “He’s a competitor, so there’s a side of him that is very competition-led, but in terms of him just wanting to soak up information, that is my favorite part about him.”
- “This is not the floor for Ekene,” Greene said. “This is his basement. He is long. Athletic. He can move laterally. There are some things he has to work on in his core, but outside of that, he has the length. He has all the tools. It’s just going to be somebody taking the time and piecing them all together. If they do it right, he’s a first-day [NFL] draft pick.”
- The main coaching point for Ogboko right now is to slow things down. He wants to maul the defensive lineman. “I want it to look right,” Greene said. “Can you maul the kid the same way every play? With your hands inside? With your base wide and you’re getting hinged, and you roll your hips through the block. It is more of those things where he is still learning the game. But in terms of his effort and laying it all on the line? I’m not talking about that switch. That switch is always on. He’s always competing. I’m talking about flipping the switch to play with more polish and great technique on every play in his game.”
- The staff at South Garner squeezes all they can out of their kids. Make no mistake about that. He has already been coached hard and will be able to adjust to a lot more of the same. The UGA staff likes to ask the question, “Can he take hard coaching?” when it comes to priority targets, and that answer with Ogboko is a resounding yes.
Have you seen this week’s “Before the Hedges” weekly recruiting special on YouTube yet? Check it out below.
SENTELL’S INTEL
(Check on the recent reads on Georgia football recruiting)
