UNC Recruiting Week of 6/24: Puff Johnson may be eligible for the 2019 season

Welcome to this week’s recruiting update! It has been an extremely busy week in both Carolina football and basketball. Mack Brown has continued to do a lot of damage on the recruiting trail, and continues to land recruits to help lead the charge of his 2020 campaign. Meanwhile, Roy Williams sent out a trio of scholarship offers this week, and there’s whispers that a brother of a certain former Tar Heel may actually be eligible to play for the 2019 season. Without further delay, let’s dive into some news.

Football

• As Akil Guruparan covered earlier this week, 2019 standout prospect Malik Hornsby decommitted from the University of North Carolina. Ranked the 5th best dual-threat QB in the country, Hornsby’s announcement left no bread crumbs leading to why he had a change of heart about playing for Mack Brown. It’s very likely, however, that it has to do with the current quarterback situation for Brown, as he already has a surplus of quarterbacks when factoring in 2020’s Jacolby Criswell with current quarterbacks like Sam Howell and Jace Ruder. As of right now, it’s unknown which school he has his sights set on going forward, but what we do know is that he holds scholarships from powerhouses like Alabama and Auburn.
• This past Wednesday, Mack Brown and their staff beat Michigan in the recruiting battle to land 2020 target D.J. Jones. His announcement took place on Jones’ birthday, and his commitment came on the heels of his official visit to Michigan just this past weekend. Jones is a 5’11, 190-pound running back from Fayetteville, NC, where he played for Pine Forest High. He is the 39th best running back in the country, and his commitment now gives the Heels the 16th best recruiting class in the country.
• Last week, the Tar Heels landed commitments from Kaimon Rucker and Jayden Chalmers, both of whom will contribute to the defensive side of the ball. Rucker is a 6’1, 243-pound defensive end from from Hartwell, GA, and Jayden Chalmers is a 5’11 ¹⁄_2, 160-pound cornerback from Sanford, NC. Both Rucker and Chalmers attended Mack Brown’s Showtime camp, and their commitments join the list of commits that Brown received shortly after the event concluded.

Basketball

• As Jake Lawrence covered this week, Roy Williams sent out scholarship offers to three players in the 2020 class. One of those three players is 7’2 center Hunter Dickinson, who is considered to be a favorite to commit to either Notre Dame or Purdue, according to Corey Evans at Rivals. Once the scholarship was offered, Evans stated that he feels like Carolina is a legitimate contender for Dickinson, but he still believes that Purdue is the team to beat. We’ll see if Williams’ staff is able to swing things in the Heels’ direction going forward.
• Prior to this week, it was reasonable to think that Puff Johnson’s brother Cam getting drafted as the 11th overall pick of the NBA Draft would be the most interesting thing that happened for him this summer, at least as far as basketball goes. Unfortunately, this isn’t necessarily the case, as Johnson was ruled ineligible to play his senior year of high school basketball because he played in the high school ranks during 7th and 8th grade.

So what does this mean? According to Rivals’ Corey Evans, it’s possible that Johnson could finish out his high school career at a prep school. However, the most intriguing comment that Evans made is that Johnson could receive enough credits to become eligible for the 2019 college basketball season. If this proves to be true, UNC’s unusually long 2019 recruiting process could get extended into at least July in efforts to bring in an additional small forward to fill out of the depth chart. This is, of course, if Roy Williams decides that exploring this option is worth his while. Other teams that may be in the running for Johnson’s services include Arizona, Notre Dame, and Pitt.