Oklahoma football recruiting moves up with new 5-star commitment
By Chip Rouse
Oklahoma football head coach Lincoln Riley hinted at his Early Signing Day press conference that the Sooners weren’t done in filling out the 2019 recruiting class and that there was another surprise or two still to come.
There were a handful of declarations made public by high school stars participating on Saturday in the All-American Bowl, and of the eight players who announced their commitment on national television, three of them had the Sooners in their final four or five choices.
Undoubtedly, though, the future signee Riley had in mind with his comments at the Dec. 2 press conference announcing the signing of 22 members of the 2019 class, was five-star wide receiver Jadon Haselwood. The longtime Georgia commit announced on Saturday that he was headed to Norman, Oklahoma, to play football for the Sooners.
Haselwood’s announcement may have been the worst kept secret inside the Oklahoma football program. ESPN staff writer Tom VanHaaren reported the highly touted wide receiver officially signed with the Sooners during the early signing period but kept his announcement silent so he could publicly declare his intentions at the All-America Bowl.
After Haselwood decommitted from Georgia (he verbally committed to the Bulldogs in March 2017), Miami (Florida) aggressively pursued the talented receiving prospect, VanHaaren wrote, as did Georgia, Florida State and Tennessee. Miami eventually fell off Haselwood’s list, and Oklahoma immediately shot up the list, according the VanHaaren.
Haselwood’s commitment gives Oklahoma three five-star receivers and four five-star recruits overall in its 2019 class. That is the most five-stars of any school, according to Rivals, and one more than Alabama and Georgia, the two recruiting classes rated higher than OU in the current Rivals 2019 team rankings.
The addition of Haselwood moves Oklahoma up three spots, ahead of Clemson, LSU and Texas A&M, to No. 3 in the Rivals 2019 recruiting class rankings.
Haselwood, the No. 2 wide receiver and No. 4 overall prospect nationally, according to rivals, joins fellow Sooner recruits Theo Wease and Trejan Bridges, ranked No. 1 and 4, respectively, at the receiver position in the 2019 national class. This could be the best wide-receiver class in Oklahoma recruiting history and certainly adds more ammunition to an already high-powered Oklahoma offense.
The fourth five-star Sooner recruit in the 2019 class is quarterback Spencer Rattler, who also appeared in the All-America Bowl on Saturday. Rattler is rated as the top dual-threat QB nationally in the 2019 class.
Haselwood is from Ellenwood, Georgia, Wease and Bridges are both from Texas, and Rattler is out of Phoenix, Arizona.