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Virginia Tech Football Recruiting Notes 5/15/20

Landyn Watson February 2019

Virginia Tech has been busy on the recruiting trail with plenty of news surrounding top Hokie targets. Here's some of the latest updates on long-time and new VT targets.

3* WR Jaylen Jones

Richmond area three-star WR Jaylen Jones made some news last night when he announced that he would make and announce his collegiate decision tonight at 7.

Virginia Tech is the clear favorite for Jones who has become one of Virginia Tech's wide receiver targets since the Hokies offered him earlier this year. Pittsburgh has had plenty of success in Virginia and seems like the toughest challenger, but all signs and all that we've heard point heavily towards the Hokies landing their first in-state commit in weeks.

Landing Jones would be valuable to restart momentum after a quiet few weeks on the recruiting trail, especially with three-star ATH Jalen Stroman set to commit next week and the Hokies being the overwhelming favorite for Greg Stroman's brother.

Tech has also launched big recruiting runs during this time of year before with a May commitment from Darryle Simmons helping launch a strong early summer run for Justin Fuente and the Hokies which included landing Tre Turner and several others.

Right now, I would comfortably lean towards Virginia Tech landing Jaylen Jones this evening, but recruiting can definitely bring about plenty of surprises.

Update: Jaylen Jones committed to Virginia Tech. Story here.

4* DE Landyn Watson

Four-star DE and priority target Landyn Watson revealed his top 6 this week with the Hokies making the cut for him.

The Hokies were joined by an interesting group of schools that span most the country with Tennessee, Arkansas, TCU, Arizona State, and California also making the cut. At the moment, it seems like distance isn't too big of a concern for Watson given the presence of two teams from the Pac-12, one team from the ACC, and one from the SEC East.

Watson visited Virginia Tech back on February 1st and the Hokies have been trending as the frontrunner in his recruitment ever since then. Watson was planning on taking an official visit to Virginia Tech from the June 19th-21st, but the extension of the dead period has nullified that date for officials.

There are plenty of quality challengers including Tennessee which has arguably been the hottest team on the recruiting trail in the country and in-state TCU which made a big splash in their state recently landing 2020 5* RB Zach Evans.

However, what's definitely clear is that Watson's interest in Virginia Tech is personal and not dependent on having an active verbal commitment from any particular recruit. The fact of the matter is that #TX2VT is not done yet with Watson still being a primary target of it.

4* LB Jaydon Hood

Virginia Tech offered four-star LB Jaydon Hood earlier this week with Tech jumping right into the thick of it with Hood telling us that the Hokies are in "high consideration" in his recruitment. Additionally, Hood told us that the Hokies will make his upcoming recruitment cut.

Hood told us that he received the offer from LBs coach Tracy Claeys with the two having a "good" conversation where they discussed multiple things including where Hood is currently at in his recruiting process. The Hokies' interest in Hood has been a little on and off in the past, but all signs are that the Hokies are all in with Hood likely to be a priority target going forward at linebacker.

Hood may already have a loaded offer list, but there's no indication that Hood is too close to making a decision at this point. For VT, they'll likely need to try to get him on campus when visits are allowed again which, based on current pre-existing and new dead periods, isn't supposed to be till late July. At minimum, Tech could use a virtual visit to try to familiarize Hood with VT's campus and facilities.

Hood has emerged as a top linebacker target for the Hokies with Tech looking to add a couple more at LB this cycle alongside current commit Will Johnson. We'll have more on Hood in a story soon.

Update: Full story on Jaydon Hood here.

OL/DT Chris Adams

A potential new name to keep an eye on is OL/DT Chris Adams out of South Hagerstown HS in Maryland. Adams has started to receive some interest from the Hokies which led to a phone call with Virginia Tech offensive line coach Vance Vice.

Adams told us that conversation was "great" with the Hokies hoping to get to know Adams more before making a decision on whether they want to offer him or not. Tech is recruiting Adams at offensive tackle though there are some teams pursuing him more at defensive tackle.

Currently, Adams has seven offers including ones from Syracuse, Old Dominion, JMU, UMASS, Towson, and New Hampshire and Stony Brook while also receiving interest from Maryland, Rutgers, and Elon.

Adams has intriguing size at 6'5'' and 260 pounds according to Rivals, and likely could have benefitted significantly from a normal spring and early summer evaluation and camp season that was wiped out by the COVID-19 pandemic. In any case, teams are taking notice of Adams including the Hokies as they prep to take a large group of offensive linemen in their 2021 class.

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