The Football Brainiacs

Image of Neville Gallimore via U.S. All-American Bowl

We’re going to let this Open Post serve as our Christmas week post, since we’ll be celebrating with our families. If there are updates we’ll add them here or, if necessary, we’ll add a separate post. Merry Christmas to you all!

Darreyl Patterson: We got some wonderful news from Lawton 2015 CB Darreyl Patterson this morning. We rarely, if ever, report on academic stuff. It just feels very unfair to a young person, but we are always happy to pass on positive news. Patterson got an excellent score on his ACT and thus no longer has any qualification issues.

There were unfortunately a lot of people that talked about this young man and his academic situation when it was put out publicly by another website. Those kinds of things are hurtful to these young players, and Patterson was very aware of what was being said about him. But he put in the work to get done what he needed to get done and it has clearly paid off for him!

Patterson is an ultra twitchy athlete. As he develops the efficiency within his movements, he could turn into a fantastic D-I corner. The initial physical qualities you look for in a CB are speed, quickness, and length. However, everyone places a different premium on those three qualities. Patterson has speed and quickness for days, and he’s got pretty good length as well standing around 5’11”. He’s being heavily recruited by Arizona State and will take a visit there in January. He also has plans to visit Kansas State next month.

Josh Wariboko: Last night 2015 offensive lineman and former OU commit Josh Wariboko released his Top 3 which included Oklahoma, UCLA, and in a bit of a surprise Ohio State instead of Louisville (we heard that his in-home visit with coach McGee went really well). It’s our understanding, though, that the battle is really between the Sooners and Bruins.

Wariboko will announce on January 2nd at the Under Armor All-American game. If we had to guess right now, based on what we’ve heard, UCLA would be the choice. But it’s pretty clear OU believes they’ve still got a good chance, because they are waiting on the decision. If Wariboko does head to UCLA, we expect OU to still push hard for one more offensive lineman. Which could be Jalin Barnett or possibly a late flip (no names just yet, but we know they’re working on it) from someone currently committed elsewhere.

Kareem Orr: As most of you know, 2015 CB Kareem Orr is very high on the Sooners. In talking to him, we get a strong sense OU is currently his leader. However, Orr will take a trip to Arizona State and we are told he has a lot of early intrigue in the Sun Devils (those darn palm trees!). The interesting thing will be to see how it plays out with Orr and Patterson as both are ASU targets.

In talking to sources, we’ve been told that Patterson is the No. 1 cornerback on ASU’s board. In fact, we’ve been told that ASU believes Patterson is the best cornerback their coaches have seen in this 2015 class. ASU currently has zero DB commits, so it’s likely they’d be interested in taking both but it’s something to watch.

Anthony Wheeler: Caught up with the 2015 Skyline LB yesterday and he confirmed that he will also announce his decision at the Under Armor All-American Game on Jan. 2nd. Wheeler’s final four are OU, Texas, LSU & Baylor. However it’s long been thought to be an OU vs. Texas battle, with Baylor having an outside chance. Some have speculated, though, that Texas may pull back now that they landed 5-star LB, Malik Jefferson.

We have talked to some Texas folks and while that speculation exists, no one has been able to confirm whether or not the Horns will back off. So we are assuming that Texas is still pursuing Wheeler. For whatever it’s worth, we did get the sense in talking to him yesterday that while he said OU and Texas are even, the Sooners are looking pretty good here.

On a related note, Alex and I (K) we’re talking about Wheeler this weekend and he offered up his thoughts on Wheeler from the times he’s seen him live. He said that Wheeler sometimes looks a little slow, but he insisted that he’s got plenty of speed and quickness. Alex said he got the sense that Wheeler is just a little slow to diagnose a play and is hesitating. That’s a very correctable issue and with Wheelers great size, frame, and downhill speed, if OU can land him he could make a nice addition to a class that now has Ricky DeBerry in the fold.

No one will ever mistake DeBerry or Wheeler for safeties…that’s for sure.

Neville Gallimore: Oklahoma wants the big time Canadian prospect, and they’ve made that abundantly clear to Gallimore and his family. They’ve recruited both heavily and the more we find out about this situation and talk to folks close to it, the more we feel this one may in fact play out in OU’s favor. In fact, at this point, we’d cautiously say OU is the favorite.

In talking to people around Neville, we’ve been told in no uncertain terms that Jerry Montgomery and Bob Stoops have simply done a better job recruiting him. the Ohio State (the primary contender to OU) staff has put in the work, but haven’t been as strategically sound in the way they’ve gone about building relationships with people around Neville. tOSU’s in-home visit with Neville, we are told, did not go very well.

Meanwhile, we’ve been told the Gallimore family was very comfortable with Stoops and Montgomery. And there seems to be a trust built there that doesn’t necessarily exist with other staffs. Gallimore plans on making his decision at the U.S. Army All-American game or shortly thereafter, so early January is shaping up to be a very, very important time for OU recruiting.

– UPDATE (Dec. 24, 8:39 am): If you haven’t seen already, OU did not make the cut for 2015 WR Ryan Newsome. However, the Sooners do still appear to be after another wideout as they are expected to host JUCO WR Dominique Reed some time in January.

– UPDATE (Dec. 24, 8:42 am): Also going down last night was 2015 OK Preps WR Dahu Green reopening his recruiting, though he was clear Louisville is still very much under consideration. But before you get too excited, we’ve heard OU isn’t likely to get involved here. Keep an eye on Mike Leach and Washington State.