To say the last month for the Louisville Cardinals has been a whirlwind, it would be an understatement. With the unannounced leaving of Scott Satterfield, to the three days without a Head Coach, to the poaching of the coaching staff by Cincinnati, to the Wasabi Fenway Bowl against Cincinnati, to the decommitment of Rueben Owens, to National Signing Day, it has been a month that you would have to se to believe.
One of the factors that has been affected by each of these events is the fluctuation of Louisville’s overall ranking on the recruiting boards. Before Rueben Owens flipped to Texas A&M, the recruiting class ranking climbed inside the Top 25 in the nation. But now with the departure of DeAndre Moore to Texas, the ranking has plummeted to 42nd overall in the nation.
The saving grace for the Cardinals is Head Coach Jeff Brohm’s ability to scour the transfer portal for extremely talented athletes. Up to this point, Louisville has received commitments from seven transfers with five of them being former four-star recruits coming out of high school.
Five of the seven transfers are defensive talents.
- Stephen Herron Jr, Edge Rusher
- Rodney McGraw, Edge Rusher
- Devin Neal Jr, Safety
- Myles Slusher, Safety
- Marquis Groves-Killibrew, Cornerback
The only two offensive weapons coming in, at the moment, are wide receivers Jimmy Calloway, from Tennessee, and Jadon Thompson, from Cincinnati. With all of these new weapons coming in, it lifted the Cardinals’ transfer portal ranking from 98th to 43rd overall, which is good enough to tie the recruit ranking.
Louisville has officially signed Madden Sanker, Aaron Williams, Pierce Clarkson, Adonijah Green, Stanquan Clark, Luke Burgess, Micah Carter, William Fowles, Cataurus Hicks, Jahlil McClain, Keyjuan Brown, and Saadiq Clements thus far. The only piece left to fall for the Cardinals is four-star tight end Jamari Johnson out of Inglewood, California, who has pushed his signing day back to January 7, 2023.
Inglewood (Calif.) TE and #Louisville commit Jamari Johnson will not be signing today and will now announce during the @AABonNBC January 7, officially visited #Oregon and #Pittsburgh the last two weeks and #Cincinnati is making a late push now as well pic.twitter.com/UBbaEHzYTL
— Greg Biggins (@GregBiggins) December 21, 2022
The 6-foot-5 tight end would be a huge addition to this class and would fill a void in tight end depth that the Cardinals need filled. The major losses in this class were the aforementioned Rueben Owens and DeAndre Moore. The less noticeable losses were cornerbacks Jayden Davis and Rayquan Adkins who both followed the former staff to the University of Cincinnati.
All of these movements have helped cause the drastic fluctuation for Louisville, but the fact that this team is still in the Top 50 recruiting classes in the nation says a lot about the future of the program and Brohm’s ability to recruit. Imagine what he could do with a full calendar year of recruiting capabilities.