MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Better high school football players are coming out of the state of West Virginia, and Dana Holgorsen and Co. are taking notice.
The Mountaineers secured commitments from two of the top players in the Mountain State in the last week after locking in the top two prospects in last year's recruiting class.
Since 2015, the number of in-state players offered scholarships and then signed by West Virginia has gone up. Back in 2015, Holgorsen predicted that would happen because of the up-tick in talent throughout West Virginia.
"We’ve always done the same thing. We’ve identified guys. We’ve recruited them. We made decisions on whether to offer them or whether we don’t based off information… we’ve done the same thing we’ve been doing," Holgorsen said then. "It just seems like there is more going on within the state in (the 2015) class and the next couple of classes than in my previous three years. It’s not anymore of an emphasis, it just seems like there’s more to choose from."
From 2012-2014, West Virginia signed just two in-state players to a scholarship — fullback Eli Wellman out of Spring Valley High School and offensive lineman Amanii Brown out of Morgantown High. Brown later transferred while Wellman became one of the fan favorites around the program.
Beginning with the 2015 class, Holgorsen's staff has managed to sign nine in-state prospects out of high school (which doesn't include junior college transfers like Trevon Wesco, who went to Musselman High in Inwood). Almost all of those have found ways to contribute and are now littered throughout the starting lineups, mainly defensively.
Over the past week, Holgorsen secured commitments from University High athlete Amir Richardson and Capital High safety Kerry Martin Jr. They rank fourth and fifth in the state, respectively.
For Richardson, the decision was easy. He's a local kid who grew up with inside knowledge of the program as his father Tony Richardson Sr. played defensive tackle for the Mountaineers in the in the early 1990s.
"I wanted to go here because I grew up watching WVU, and I just love how loyal the fan base is," Richardson told DKPittsburghSports. "That really made me want to go here, and I couldn’t pass up the chance to play Power 5 football and be able to see my family. No other school can offer me that."
Meanwhile, Martin comes from the southern part of the state where other top athletes have almost seemed to shun the Mountaineers. Five-star offensive tackle Darnell Wright from Huntington has offers from Alabama, Clemson, Florida, Florida State and Georgia, among many others, whereas Spring Valley guard Doug Nester has already committed to Ohio State.
Martin, though, said West Virginia was his best fit.
"The coaches wanted me to stay home and I will have the opportunity to play my first year," said Martin, who also quarterbacks Captial's football squad and is viewed as a front-runner for the Kennedy Award, given annually to the state's top player by the West Virginia Sportswriters Association.
Martin told other media outlets, too, that he, Richardson and Martinsburg's Dewayne Grantham, who committed to West Virginia earlier this year, talked about their decisions together and they all had a mutual feeling that they wanted to play for the Mountaineers.
"Just like myself, the other guys have chosen to play here in the state because of the environment and the support system we have here, let alone our families still live here as well," Martin told DKPittsburghSports. "We feel as if we can do big things in a big conference which is only a couple minutes or hours away. The question really is, why not stay home?"
West Virginia, though, catches flak from the fan base for letting in-state players slip away, most notably being George Washington superstar Ryan Switzer, who went on to break records at North Carolina before being drafted by the Dallas Cowboys in 2017.
The perception around the fan base is that West Virginia shuns those players while looking elsewhere, but the reality of the situation is as simple as noticing there has never been much top talent in West Virginia until recently.
And the Mountaineers have done a good job at securing a good chunk of that top talent.
For the 2018 recruiting season, Holgorsen received commitments from the top two players in the state in defensive end Dante Stills (Fairmont Senior HS) and defensive lineman Tavis Lee (Martinsburg). Stills has a chance to make some noise this year, while Lee is likely to greyshirt and be reclassified to the 2019 class.
Stills was a four-star recruit while Lee was a three-star, according to Rivals. Of the other three prospects in the Top 5, two went to Marshall and one chose Toledo. All three were considered two-star prospects.
In 2017, West Virginia signed three of the top seven in-state prospects — defensive back Derrek Pitts, linebacker Maverick Wolfley and defensive lineman Darius Stills. Wolfley — rated the fourth-best prospect in the state — has since transferred to Akron whereas Pitts — rated the state's top player —and Stills — rated seventh — are considered key defensive backups heading into their sophomore season.
The other three in the top five were offensive linemen from southern West Virginia and chose out-of-state Power 5 schools. Riley Locklear received time as a backup at Tennessee last season, Billy Ross redshirted at North Carolina and Seth Stewart never reported to camp at LSU.
In 2016, West Virginia signed defenders Reese Donahue (Cabell Midland) and Dylan Tonkery (Bridgeport), rated the top two players in the state. The rest of the Top 5 are not playing at Power 5 schools. In 2015, West Virginia signed two of the top three prospects in Stone Wolfely (Morgantown) and Deamonte Lindsay (Martinsburg).
So, outside of a handful of offensive line prospects, West Virginia has been able to maintain a good enough grip on in-state talent to sign and retain players from the Mountain State. And that doesn't include the number of walk-ons that join the program and make impacts on scout team and special teams.