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THREE THINGS WE LEARNED
1. Today is bittersweet for the Suchomel family
As I post this column from a hotel lobby in Houston, we’re less than 24 hours away from when most of the uncommitted members of the 2023 class will send in their letters of intent on National Signing Day 2. In most years, NSD2 would take center stage in this column, but today my head is in a completely different universe.
A bit of a personal story, if you’ll indulge me …
Last night, my wife and I watched our 18-year-old son walk through the security checkpoint at Intercontinental Airport in Houston to embark on a journey that has me feeling a variety of emotions, with pride and sadness dominating at the moment. Zachary, the oldest of our four children, is off to Kyoto, Japan for a three-month stay.
It was about a year and a half ago when I was picking our son up from school and he texted me that he was going to be a bit late because he was meeting with the school counselor. “Well this can’t be good,” I thought. When he got in my truck he proceeded to tell me that he scheduled the meeting after talking to another kid at school who had done a study abroad program. Our son has really been fascinated with Asian culture/cuisine in his teenage years, so he took it upon himself to talk to the school counselor about exchange student programs. My natural instinct was to not take things too seriously, figuring it was just a whim and he’d either change his mind or plans would fall through in typical teenage fashion.
To my surprise, Zachary continued to meet with his counselor but eventually he hit what we thought might be a nonnegotiable snag. Because he would turn 18 in the fall, prior to when he would have been traveling to Japan as an exchange student, he was ineligible for the program. Odd rule, but that shut things down, or so we thought.
Zachary continued to meet with his counselor and they came up with a plan that might work, with quite a bit of extra effort. If he graduated early (in December), he could then travel to Japan in the spring as part of a “gap year” program for students who want to take a bit of time before enrolling in college. They found a program that covered only the spring semester, with a price tag of a whopping $11,000.
Our son had already been working at a nearby sandwich shop, and he’s a kid that really doesn’t ask for or need a lot, so he had been banking pretty much every penny of his paychecks. He continued to work for the rest of his junior year, continued to save.
Last summer, when most soon-to-be seniors are taking it easy in their final summer of high school, Zachary continued to work. On top of that, he took it upon himself and signed up for two online Japanese language courses through Austin Community College (I didn’t even know you could do that before graduating high school). He took those two classes in the morning and then worked in the afternoon/evening all summer to save more money for his trip. Even on a family vacation to Curacao, when the rest of us were at the beach, our son would stay in the VRBO rental and do his online college course before meeting up with us later in the day. I told him it was okay to miss a day or two of class while out of the country. He would have none of it.
This fall, his senior year, he took his regular course load, continued to work, and somehow still took two online courses in core classes so that he would have the necessary school credits to graduate a semester early. He powered through and officially graduated from Rouse High School in December. With all the money he had saved working for the past couple of years, he paid for his trip in full … all $11K of it.
As I post this, he’s somewhere in the middle of a 16.5-hour flight that will take him from Houston to Taipei. From there, he’ll board one more flight that will land in Osaka, where he’ll start his three-month journey, before returning home and starting college in the fall.
I write this with a bit of a heavy heart and some butterflies in my stomach, but more than that, I write this with an incredible amount of pride for the work my son has put in and the type of young man he’s become. He’s driven, he’s kind, he’s a tremendous brother to his three younger sisters and he just has a pure heart that he MUST have gotten from his mother because he sure as hell didn’t get it from me.
Safe travels son. Soak it up. I love you very much.
2. Texas continues to hit the right notes with Michael Uini
Copperas Cove offensive lineman Michael Uini is a priority target for Texas (and most other schools) in the 2024 recruiting cycle, and the Rivals250 standout was in Austin recently for a UT junior day. As has been the case with previous trips to Austin, Texas made a strong impression.
“Every time I come back to Texas it’s a really cool place that makes me feel at home,” Uini said.
With offers from all over the country, Uini is keeping an open mind. Texas has what would seem to be a slight advantage in proximity over most schools, but Uini says location won’t be a determining factor in his decision.
“It's definitely something I look at, but it's not really important to me,” Uini said. “Distance from home, it is cool being an hour away from here but it’s not that important for me.”
Texas offensive line coach Kyle Flood has done a good job building a bond with Uini in the early stages of this recruitment. During the junior day visit, sitting in on the offensive line meetings was one of the highlights for Uini.
“Being in the position meeting, meeting with coach Flood, seeing the way he was coaching some things about being an O-lineman, that was pretty cool to me,” Uini said. “I just love the way he coaches them, the way he is as a person. It’s not just him, also coach Sark. I just love what they're doing for Texas and what they're trying to bring to Texas.”
Uini said he’s taking the process slowly and doesn’t have any favorites, but would like to take visits to places like Michigan, Florida, Alabama and Georgia at some point.
3. Texas will receive strong consideration from 2024 CB Braylon Conley
Atascocita cornerback Braylon Conley already holds close to 30 scholarship offers, so he’ll be another national recruit that’s going to take some times to sort out. He too visited Texas recently, and he’s another who meshed well with the UT staff.
“It went well. The whole staff was great,” Conley said of his recent junior day visit. ”Everybody's personalities, it was just a vibe, felt like family.
“I was able to speak to coach Sark, coach Joseph, coach Davis. They were just basically telling me that they love me, they love my game. And it's a family environment out there and I’ll enjoy the people out there.”
The 6-0, 170-pound Conley visited Arkansas and TCU this past weekend. He says he doesn’t have any favorites, or a timeline for how things will play out. Johnson’s size and physicality has coaching staffs in hot pursuit, and Texas should figure into this one pretty heavily.
“They love the way I play, love the way I can come down and can tackle and also cover,” Johnson said of the message form the Texas coaches on his recent visit. “I feel like I can tackle a lot better than a lot of corners. As far as working on something, pretty much everything. I’m still new to the position, so there’s a lot of stuff I can learn about it.”
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TWO QUESTIONS
1. What’s the latest with weekend visitor Warren Roberson?
Red Oak safety Warren Roberson remains committed to TCU, at least technically. TCU continues to fight to hang onto him. Schools like Texas, USC and SMU are fighting to win out down the stretch.
Roberson, as much as any player in this class, keeps a tight lid on what he’s thinking. When I say the standout DB keeps a tight circle, it’s damn near nonexistent. Even people at his school, those who see him every day, don’t have a clear read on what he’s thinking.
All that being said, the timing of the Texas visit combined with some grapevine chatter over the course of the weekend would all seem to favor the Longhorns. That’s where my pick has been for a while and while the picture isn’t crystal clear, that’s where it remains today. We were hearing there was a chance that some sort of announcement could come down on Sunday night, but sources at Red Oak said Roberson may wait until Wednesday to announce his final decision, which appears to be the case.
2. Which 2024 players would be wise to pencil in to the Texas class?
There wasn’t a ton of action from UT’s recent junior day, as expected, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t some morsels of information that were picked up, bits that we’ll use to put in some way-too-early educated guesses on five players that could be members of the Texas 2024 class at some point. Visits to places like Texas A&M and Oklahoma last weekend made things a bit more unpredictable, but when I put out the first edition of the 2024 Recruiting Board in the very near future, I’ll have all of these guys at 50 percent or higher probability to wind up in Austin.
OL Michael Uini – Texas will have to beat out some heavy-hitters in this one, but Uini does like Kyle Flood, he’s visited multiple times over the last year. He feels like a guy that Flood could prioritize as a benchmark player in this recruiting cycle, and Flood doesn’t miss on many of those.
OL Ory Williams – I don’t think Williams has missed a Texas recruiting event in the past 12 months and while he maintains that he has no favorites, the dude can’t help but smile from ear to ear when he discusses his Texas visits.
OL Daniel Cruz – Flood has made Cruz a priority as an interior OL target, and Cruz seems to appreciate those efforts. I like him as a center take for Texas.
DL Alex January – I still haven’t talked to January to get a read on his junior day visit, but this one looks pretty good considering his dad played at Texas.
DB Kobe Black – Like Uini, this one is going to have several power players involved, but he really likes Texas quite a bit and having high school teammate Jelani McDonald on campus can’t hurt the Longhorns’ chances.
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ONE PREDICTION – Texas’s remaining 2023 targets …
S Warren Roberson – The pick: Texas – USC is still hanging around. TCU isn’t going away and SMU is trying to get involved. People on the TCU side seem to think this one was going back and forth as recently as Monday. Roberson makes it damn near impossible to get a clear read and I’m not even sure he’ll tell college coaches before he announces, but I’m sticking with my Texas pick.
TE Duce Robinson – The pick: Georgia – USC was the very early leader but most feel things swung UGA’s way after Robinson’s OV to Athens. Will that stick, or will he choose to stay closer to home? Or could Texas pull a pretty significant upset? The other question … will he even sign on Wednesday?
DT Jonathan Davis – The pick: Mississippi State – Texas made a late run here, but him not visiting and option to visit in-state MSU was pretty telling.
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