Texas Tech football: Big recruiting weekend on tap for Matt Wells

With the traditional signing day quickly approaching, the Texas Tech football program is hosting a number of important targets in the current and upcoming classes this weekend.

This weekend’s monumental basketball game against Kentucky is not only a great opportunity for Chris Beard’s team, but it also provides a great showcase for the entire university. Taking advantage of that will be Matt Wells and the Texas Tech football program which will be hosting a number of high-priority targets on Saturday.

Though the current recruiting class is still being finalized, the majority of the prospects headed to town this weekend will be members of the 2021 class. That’s because most believe that Tech, which signed 19 players in December, will fill up the rest of the 2020 class with JUCO and grad transfers who can help immediately.

But one huge 2020 high school target still on the market is defensive end Philip Blidi. The 3-star player from nearby Portales, New Mexico has been a long-time Red Raider commit but he decided not to sign in the early period. That left many to wonder if he was on the verge of decommitting or flipping his commitment altogether.

The good news for Red Raider fans is that Blidi has tweeted out that he will be in Lubbock this weekend which is a great indication that Tech is in excellent shape in this key regional recruiting battle. Already 6-foot-4 and 255-pounds, Blidi holds offers from Kansas, UCLA, Utah, SMU and a host of smaller programs. Should he sign with the Red Raiders, the 3-star prospect might see immediate playing time next year along a defensive line that was woefully thin in 2019 and which lost senior DT Broderick Washington to graduation.

Meanwhile, the bell cow of Tech’s 2021 class, 4-star QB Behren Morton will also be in Lubbock this weekend, along with as many as a dozen other 2021 targets. The Eastland product, who was born in Lubbock, is the No. 7 dual-threat QB in the nation and the No. 39 player in Texas.

Committed to Tech since October, he’s the most important piece to the next recruiting class for Matt Wells and Co. and it will be important to have him on hand this weekend to help spearhead the recruiting efforts with other top targets in his class.

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4-star RB Cam’Ron Valdez also intends on being in Lubbock this weekend. 5-foot-9, 180-pounds from Rockdale, Texas, Valdez is the No. 20 RB in the nation and No. 45 player in Texas. He holds offers from Michigan, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma State, Ole Miss, Utah, and West Virginia.

Brandon Epton Jr. has Tweeted that he will be in the Hub City on Saturday. He’s a 6-foot, 185-pound running back from Dallas. A 3-star prospect, he’s the No. 102 player in the Lone Star State. He has offers from Cal, Houston, Illinois, Kansas, and SMU but is yet to pick up an official offer from Tech.

An interesting defensive target, LB Donovan Stephens, will also be on hand. The 3-star LB from Oklahoma City is the No. 38 outside LB in the class of 2021 and already holds offers from Tech, Baylor, and Oklahoma State.

3-star TE Landen King is also coming in for this big weekend. The Humble, Texas native is 6-foot-5, 210-pound athlete who is the No. 28 tight end in the 2021 class. He has offers from Houston, Purdue, Tennessee, and Virginia Tech.

It feels like the 2021 class could be the one that makes or breaks Matt Wells in Lubbock. The 2020 class is currently ranked No. 47 nationally and No. 7 in the Big 12, a nice step forward after two bad classes in the two previous years but not nearly good enough to compete at the highest levels of the Big 12.

Thus, he needs to not only make a splash in 2021 and prove that he can recruit better than his predecessor in Lubbock but he needs to prove to be an adept evaluator of talent as his upcoming classes simply can’t afford the type of attrition that recent Red Raider classes have had. By the time the players in the 2021 class are ready to form the backbone of the roster, Wells will be far enough into his tenure that it will be time to evaluate his effectiveness.

If that class has proven by 2023 or so that it is ready to be one that lifts Tech back towards the upper half of the conference, Wells could be in for a long stay in West Texas. But if the 2021 class is a bust or is just simply average, it could spell the end of the line for the Red Raiders’ current regime.

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