Early signs from 2020 recruiting class indicate a bright future for Tulane Football

Michael Weiss, Contributing Reporter

With the 2019 Green Wave Football season behind us, it’s time to look forward to the future.

The Wave finished the season strong, securing its sixth bowl win ever and its first bowl victories in consecutive years in program history.

In the team’s presentation of the Armed Forces Bowl Trophy at halftime during the men’s basketball game against USF last Wednesday, head coach Willie Fritz preached that the back-to-back victories are just the beginning, and the program’s goal going forward is sustained success, including a conference championship.

As is the case every off-season, it has come time for the team to retool. Thus far, the program has 19 recruits who have signed letters of intent and three transfers from other programs. 

Traditionally recruiting almost exclusively from the Southeast, Tulane’s class this year features  recruits from Northern states as well, such as Pennsylvania, Illinois and Indiana.

The class of incoming freshmen is headlined by Angelo Anderson, a defensive end out of local John Curtis Christian School and the highest rated recruit of the bunch according to 247sports.com. Tulane has 18 incoming freshmen thus far rated at three stars out of five, an upgrade from last year’s recruiting class which featured 15.

This class also features three experienced transfers from Power 5 conferences in Kyle Myers, a cornerback from Florida State; Mykel Jones, a wide receiver out of the University of Oklahoma; and Kevin Henry, a safety transferring from Oklahoma State. All three were highly rated recruits out of high school.

Perhaps the biggest hole to fill this off-season is at quarterback, as former signal caller Justin McMillan has exhausted his eligibility. The program had briefly secured former Texas Tech quarterback Jeff Duffey. However, he decommitted from Tulane due to his denial of academic admission to the university just two days after his commitment. 

This year’s class includes two quarterback recruits, Michael Pratt and Justin Ibieta from Deerfield Beach, Florida, and Metairie, Louisiana, respectively. Redshirt Junior and Southern Mississippi transfer, Keon Howard, figures to be the leading candidate to start the 2020 season, however.

The Green Wave’s 2020 recruiting class ranks 66th in the country and second in the conference as of now, improvements from last year’s 94th and eighth ranks, respectively.

With the NCAA football recruiting season ending on June 1, the program is well on its way to securing a solid, if not strong, recruiting class for 2020 and a bright future. For the first time in many years, sustained success for the Green Wa

ve Football team seems plausible.

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