Don’t mind North Carolina, it’s just continuing its March football recruiting roll under Mack Brown.
Earlier this month, four-star 2021 prospect Drake Maye, the No. 6 pro-style quarterback in the country, committed to North Carolina football. Maye had been committed to Alabama since July of last year. Over the next two days, the Tar Heels received a pair of verbals from two other 2021 four-stars -- wide receiver Kobe Paysour and offensive tackle Eli Sutton.
While North Carolina football was quiet on the recruiting front for the next week and a half or so -- and Ohio State wasn’t -- the Tar Heels made some noise again as DeAndre Boykins verballed to the ACC school Wednesday night.
In confirming his commitment, the defensive back praised the 68-year-old North Carolina football head coach.
“He’s just a great coach first of all and he’s a great person,” Boykins said of Brown. “He cares about you and your family. And you can see it, it shows. I felt at home when I was there. I felt that all the coaches wanted me.”
A four-star 2021 prospect, Boykins is rated as the No. 9 player regardless of position in the state of North Carolina. He chose UNC over offers from, among others, Auburn, Clemson, Michigan, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Penn State and Wisconsin.
With Bryant’s verbal, North Carolina football now has commitments from 11 2021 recruits. Of those, nine are four-star prospects. That’s tied with Clemson for the second-most in this cycle. Ohio State is tops with 10.
Of those 11 Tar Heels commitments, 10 of them played their high school football in the state of North Carolina.
For the 2020 cycle, Brown landed nine four-star recruits. That gives him 18 (and counting) in two seasons as the North Carolina football head coach. In the four cycles prior to Brown’s return to Chapel Hill, the program had signed 17 four-star recruits. Combined.
Currently, the Tar Heels can claim the fourth-ranked class in the country. Ohio State (No. 1), Florida (No. 2) and Clemson (No. 3) are the only schools ahead of UNC at the moment.
This century, North Carolina football has never had a Top-Five recruiting class. Their highest-ranked class in that span was 10th in 2007, the first year under Butch Davis. The Tar Heels have had five other classes that were Top 20 — 2020 (19th), 2018 (20th), 2011 (18th), 2009 (12th) and 2003 (18th).
Brown, of course, is no stranger to highly-rated recruiting classes. His last 14 years as the head coach at Texas, the Longhorns finished in the Top 10 on 10 different occasions. Included among that was the top-ranked class in 2002. Brown also pulled in the No. 2 classes in 2010 and 2012.
All told, Brown had five Top-Five classes during his time in Austin.