After failing to sign a tight end in the class of 2020, the Oregon Ducks have made the position a priority in the 2021 recruitment cycle.
And given the amount of tight end talent on the west coast this year, the timing couldn’t be much better.
According to Rivals, seven of the 14 best tight ends in the nation come from the footprint of the Pac-12 Conference.
But proximity to elite talent and the ability to attract those players as future student athletes is not the same.
The stars must align for this to happen, and for Oregon it has.
Eight stars, actually.
Having secured Adidas’s All-American team and consensual four-star tight end Moliki Matavao in late May, Mario Cristobal and his team got off to a great start, but needed at least one more potential impact jumbo pin.
On Thursday, rivals’ four-star prospect Terrance Ferguson, the country’s No. 7 tight end, announced his commitment to the Ducks, choosing Oregon over fellow finalists Auburn, Tennessee, USC and Wisconsin.
For the 6-foot-6-pound, 230-pound player at Heritage High School (Littleton, Colorado), the key to his recruitment was a combination of comfort with the coaching staff and the belief that offensive coordinator Joe Moorhead could use it effectively. during his college career.
“I chose Oregon because the coaching staff is familiar to me now and the crime matches what I want to do and gives me an opportunity to achieve my dreams,” said Ferguson.
While recruitment rankings are sometimes based on projection, Colorado’s product is a combination of a projectable framework and athletics with significant high school output.
In the past two years, Ferguson has accumulated 123 catches for 1,901 yards and 23 touchdowns.
Equally impressive, his recruitment has not been shaken by potential competition at the university.
Each of the five Ferguson finalists had at least one tight end commitment already in the fold, and Oregon (Matavao), Wisconsin (Jack Pugh), Tennessee (Hudson Wolfe, Miles Campbell) have at least one bluechip promise in the post.
With Ferguson in the fold, the Oregon class jumps from No. 8 nationwide to No. 6 according to 247Sports, beating Florida and Michigan, but remains No. 2 in the Pac-12 Conference.
However, the addition of four stars moves the seven-point ducks behind the Trojans (244.82) to less than 0.2 (244.66).
More importantly, Oregon underpins possibly its greatest need from the 2021 recruitment cycle with two of the nation’s seven tightest extremes.
– Andrew Nemec | [email protected] | @AndrewNemec
