Nebraska Football already in uphill battle with top in-state prospects

Nebraska football will have their work cut out for them.

You have heard me talk a little bit about the in-state talent that the state of Nebraska possesses for the 2022 and 2023 classes. On Saturday afternoon, two of the top in-state prospects from Nebraska released their top five teams. Unfortunately, Nebraska football was not on either of their lists.

Omaha Burke outside linebacker Devon Jackson and Omaha Central offensive lineman Deshawn Woods had some big names on their top five list, signaling that Nebraska football will have an uphill battle if they want to land these two. For his part, Jackson had Arizona State, Miami, Texas A&M, Notre Dame, and Oklahoma in his top five.

Woods had Arizona State, Miami, Texas A&M, Florida, and Missouri on his list.

It’s pretty interesting that there are no Big Ten teams on either of their lists. It’s clear that they want to go to the SEC and see if they can showcase their talents there. This is exactly what I was talking about in my last post in terms of the 2022 class. There may be a lot of good prospects in the state, but will they want to stay home?

For what it’s worth, Woods had a cool video accompanying his announcement.

Nebraska football has been connected with Woods as early as last year. There was some interest for Woods with Nebraska. At the time, I figured that the interest would grow for him, and it certainly has.

For Jackson, there are several practical teams in his top five. Miami has done better with their defense over the last couple of years. The same goes for Oklahoma. They had a very good defense last year as well. To their credit, Nebraska football has seemed to do a good job of getting the linebackers involved in the defense.

However, it seems like it is all about exposure these days and which programs can take these players to the NFL. The teams on both of these players’ lists can do that consistently. Not only that, they have a proven track record of doing so.

Hopefully, Nebraska football can somehow at least try to get these players interested in the program. I have no doubt that they will be recruiting them hard, but it is going to be an uphill battle. I certainly am not surprised by this, it’s just more of an affirmation that Nebraska football is not in the upper echelon of teams in terms of exposure and recruiting.

Although I am not surprised by that sentiment either, it certainly stings to have to come to that realization.