The big news over the weekend was that Hoboken lineman Isaac Holmes visited Rutgers.
"I liked everything I heard. Coach Schiano was straight with me and basically said if I don’t feel comfortable I shouldn’t go, but if I do I should give Rutgers a long hard consideration."
What is next for the four-star prospect?
"Pretty much I’m taking it down to the wire," he said. "I am between Pittsburgh, Rutgers and Maryland.
"All three of those I have felt really comfortable with. I felt comfortable with Florida early in the process, but they have a lot of recruits coming and the distance from home is a lot. I don’t see myself going that far. I like those three schools because I have stronger relationships with them."
Is this based off any reliable information? For what it's worth, a lot of Syracuse fans believe that their new staff is feeding Syracuse Post-Standard writer Donnie Webb recruiting info.
One major target is offensive tackle Andrew Tiller (6-5, 320) of Nassau Community College. Tiller has visited Syracuse, but wants to work in a last-second visit to Miami. He's being recruited in Miami by former SU assistant Jeff Stoutland. There's danger Will Robinson, but based on Tiller's relationship with John Anselmo, the former Nassau head coach hired by Doug Marrone to coach the Orange defensvie backs, Syracuse is the team to beat.
Malcolm Bunche visited Miami over the weekend and ended up committing there on Monday night. That's a big blow, and really disappointing.
Nothing new on the Justin Brown front.
With Stokes no longer in the picture, if the Nittany Lions are going to add another wide receiver to their 2009 recruiting class, it will be Justin Brown from Wilmington (Del.) Concord.
The 6-foot-3 and 210-pound Brown made official visits to Penn State and Rutgers and has narrowed his decision down to the two. Brown was attending a banquet on Monday night, but did have a minute to tell Nittany Network he is still trying to make a decision between the two.
Last week, Ka'Lial Glaud sounded like he was still undecided, but leaning against taking a visit.
Glaud, aka "KG", has already visited Iowa (Nov. 15), West Virginia (Dec. 6) and Maryland (Dec. 12) and is supposed to visit Rutgers on Jan. 23, but admits that he may visit elsewhere. "I’m set up to go to Rutgers this weekend," he said. "But I’m not sure."
He says he’s also considering Louisville, Tennessee and North Carolina. With three schools and only two visits remaining, Glaud says the local-favorite may end up as the odd man out. "I’ve been to Rutgers like six times already," he said. "They are only about an hour away and I know them pretty well."
Weeks ago, this update indicated that all of Anthony Williams's major suiters were backing off. The St. Petersberg Times reported a few days ago that he would visit this weekend, however he verballed to Troy last weekend and that supports the theory that he didn't have any other options. We're running out of targets at receiver, with the news that Dwayne Difton is going to UConn and canceling his visit to Rutgers.
With David Osei, Rutgers has landed another top high school wrestler that will be abandoning the mat in college.
Tom Savage fell a few spots in the final Rivals.com state rankings for Pennsylvania.
Savage has a rough senior season behind a very inexperienced offensive line but bounced back with a strong week at the U.S. Army All-American Bowl.
Before you want to panic over those statistics: consider this. There was another recent Philadelphia prep QB, who had a 52% completion percentage over his career, and only threw for 1,300 yards and 9 touchdowns as a senior. His name? Matt Ryan.
Rivals also came out with its postseason NJ top 30. The biggest flaw with this list would have to be the outrageously low ranking for Aaron Hayward, who is one of the highlights of this year's class for Rutgers. I don't necessarily think it's a big deal that Rutgers only has one top 10 player from in-state; Greg Schiano and co. clearly aren't working off this list. Should Penn State be worried that everyone in Pennsylvania is going out of state too? Nope.
SI's Andy Staples looks at the State of Rutgers. He also reports that the average Rutgers recruit comes from 365 miles away (obviously taking into account all of the players from southern Florida), 2/3rds of them live within 200 miles of campus, 42.7% come from the State of New Jersey.
MGoBlog reported that our coaching staff recently checked in on 2010 Michigan verbal Ricardo Miller.
Quinton Pitts is a new name for 2010 who is reporting some contact, I don't really expect to be heavily involved in Western PA though.
"I just talked to (coach) Robert Fraser from Rutgers yesterday. He said he would try to come down and see me soon, if not this month then the first day of next month. They’re working on their (2009) recruiting class right now so they’re thinking about that."
Right now two of those three schools are at the top of his list of favorites.
"Right now my top two is Rutgers and Minnesota. I like the way Minnesota does things. They like guys to come in and compete. Rutgers is the same way."