#1 LB JELANI JENKINS FAMILY LOVES NOTRE DAME

I've been slacking on the college football recruiting front lately so I figured I would give you a little update on the #1 rated prep linebacker in the nation. His name is Jelani Jenkins and he was the Maryland Gatorade Player of the Year last year as a junior out of Wheaton(MD)Our Lady of Good Counsel. He is currently ranked the #1 linebacker by Rivals and the #2 rated WLB by Scout and he is highly coveted by every major football program around the country. He also reportedly carries a 4.0 GPA and is looking for a program with both a high standard for academics as well as on the gridiron.

Jelani and his family have already taken a road trip earlier this summer out West to visit the campuses of Stanford, USC and UCLA and this past week they made another road trip to the Midwest to visit the campuses of Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame, and Illinois. Mike Farrell of Rivals.com got a scoop on how the visits went in the Midwest from Jelani's father Maurice...

"Michigan was impressive, we liked the facilties and the academics. They just built a new facility for academic support and Michigan has a good reputation for academics. And on the football side, they showed us Michigan's defense from last year and how Jelani would fit into it. We were really impressed with the strength program and the trainers, that was one of the most impressive things we saw."

And how was Michigan State?

"They are doing a lot of growing," Maurice said. "They are putting a lot of money into the program and making some major renovations so the dedication is there. We met with coach Gill and the defensive coordinator, coach Pat Narduzzi and were very grateful for the time they spent with us."

And after MSU, it was on to Notre Dame.

"The Notre Dame visit went great, it's a beautiful campus, the staff was very hospitable and coach Weis has a great knowledge of the game from his NFL days. We met with Corwin Brown who went through the X's and O's with us and showed us how Jelani would fit in. He'd be a weakside linebacker for them and do a lot of blitzing.

"But we got to see the depth chart, the facilities were nice and of course the academics are excellent there. And they have a great legacy of football."

Jenkins plans to visit Florida, Boston College, and Miami in the near future and reportedly has close ties with Maryland and Penn State in terms of friends and closeness to home so his choices are still wide open with nobody definitively eliminated at this point. A lot of times these kids get a lot of hype coming out of high school and it's not exactly warranted because of either they can't qualify in terms of grades or they have already peaked in terms of performance at the high school level. Neither of these can be said about Jelani and if you have doubts about how good he is then take a look at this film of him running through and over opponents with ease...


Jenkins is the type of player who can step on campus immediately and compete for playing time as a starter so expect his decision to be well calculated in regards to what program offers the best in terms of atmosphere, academics, social life, and of course football. Who ever he chooses will be getting a hell of a football player and an even better student.