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Recruiting is the lifeblood of any major college athletics team, but following it closely as a fan can sometimes be difficult and can often be time consuming. We’ll try and condense all the recruiting news you can use into this bi-weekly (sometimes more) post. It’ll include updates on current commits, including stats from their high school games, as well as news on players the Badgers are still pursuing. Let’s get down to business!
- 2022 4-star CB Keenan Nelson, Jr. (Philadelphia, Pa.) out of St. Joe’s Prep received an offer from the Wisconsin Badgers and Jim Leonhard on Thursday, according to Nelson’s Twitter account. Nelson has 20 offers including ones from Arizona State, Georgia, Miami (Fla.), Michigan State, Penn State, Notre Dame, Nebraska, Oregon, Rutgers, Tennessee, West Virginia and Virginia.
HONORED to have received an offer from the University of Wisconsin #GoBadgers ⚪️ @jimleonhard pic.twitter.com/btzSTAhWzr
— Keenan Nelson Jr (@KeenanNelsonJr1) November 19, 2020
Nelson is a 6-foot-1 and 200 pound corner who is rated as the No. 84 player in the country by the 247 Composite. He is also the No. 10 cornerback and the No. 2 player in Pennsylvania. 247 Sports national recruiting analyst Brian Dohn has a lot of nice things to say about Nelson:
“Loose hips and changes direction with ease. Excellent timing and technique. Quick, smooth feet. Comfortable in backpedal and transitions well to turn and run with receiver. Stays tight on hip out of breaks. Can jam and re-route. Good ball skills.”
Nelson has prototypical size for a corner, especially in the Big Ten where he’ll be tasked with making plays in the run game and not just running with wideouts. You can see in some of his highlights how he engages blockers on the edge and then still makes the tackle. You wonder if he gets bigger maybe he could transition to safety?
Nelson shows great awareness and ball skills on deep routes. He also has good speed to recover if he’s beaten or when he’s closing in on a ball carrier. Nelson is the exact type of player that the Badgers need to get in order to make the “jump” to the “next level” and compete annually with the Ohio States of the world.