Senior Showcase: A name to remember

It's late, and Jim Leavitt has the podium at 9 a.m. (!) as part of the Florida Sports Writers Association state football media days in Tampa, so I have an early morning, but I wanted to get this up before it got lost in Sunday's updates.

Spent some time over on campus Saturday attending USF's Senior Showcase camp, which brought about 140 recruits in for a closer look at (and from) the Bulls. Most of what I saw were agility drills, broken down position by position, and many of the players in attendance aren't even on USF's radar. I saw three Bulls commitments firsthand -- linebacker Mike Lanaris of Lake Mary attended but didn't work out, while tight ends Andreas Shields (Wharton) and Jeff Hawkins (Ocala Vanguard) looked impressive. When you consider that only a small fraction -- maybe 10 percent -- actually have scholarship offers from USF, the size of this event is more about goodwill and establishing relationships with high school programs. Tons of family members and coaches watching the practice fields.

I don't know of any new commitments to come out of Saturday's event, but there's something notable to take from this: Saturday marked the first time Leavitt personally met Jarvis Giles. Giles is a rising junior running back at Gaither, expected to be one of the state's top prospects at any position in the Class of 2009. He was invited by USF to watch the event and get his first look at the campus and coaches, and he watched teammate Zach Henderson, a defensive back, participate in the camp.

Giles is just starting the recruiting process, but he told me he likes USF and would definitely consider the Bulls as an option -- again, he's likely more than a year away from making a decision. That puts USF in a solid, fast-growing group of schools that include Florida, Florida State, Arkansas and Tennessee. Giles, who rushed for 1,480 yards and 13 touchdowns as a sophomore, said he was impressed with Leavitt, calling him "one of the nicest dudes I've ever met in football." The Bulls haven't made a formal scholarship offer yet, but they're ahead of most schools in getting him on campus and getting started on what will be a major recruiting battle in USF's backyard.

If you haven't seen Giles play -- hey, I hadn't -- you can check out a highlight video on SunshinePreps.net. I'm off to sleep, and should have an update from Leavitt's press conference in the morning. Keep these ridiculous amounts of comments coming. ...

Comments

[Ryan]

Wow, this kid was a sophomore? He's got size, speed, he blocks and he can catch it out of the backfield...but even more impressively, his vision and utilization of his blockers. He only outran his blockers once or twice, even delaying in the backfield a few times to help his teammates get to their blocks. Having that kind of poise and patience at the high school level is surprising to say the least.

[Nickdelray]

Can you say 'Wow'.This kid is special!!After we open more eye's this year kids like this will be the norm.Thanks for the update Greg.

[E.T. Thomas]

Looking forward to your blog after Leavitt speaks this morning.

Great blog Greg.

[Cardo4]

He did this as a sophmore are you kidding me! Looks like he'll outgrow the prototype for a running back though.

[Ari]

Don't we have about 81 running backs on the roster?

You know who needs a RB...?. Florida State.

[Dave]

My theory with RBs is the one we're using this year: Just sign so many guys that one of them has to be good. We could start 4/5 guys this year. I've never felt that a team needed one guy to run when you have a strong QB. Look at L'Ville last year- Allen/Smith was just as productive as Bush would've been.

[cee]

this guy will end up being 3-stars or higher.. which means we wont get him.. leavitt will only recruit 1-stars or 2-stars that are criminals

[Claudel]

Cee,

Stay off our blog!

[Michael Uglialoro]

This kid has vision, patience, and he finds the hole then explodes