Wisconsin Football: Catching up on this week’s new offers

Wisconsin Football offered new recruits in the 2020 and 2022 classes this week.

The Wisconsin football staff has taken advantage of the bye this week to not only rest up the team as it prepares to face Nebraska next Saturday, but to make several new moves on the recruiting trail as well. We have you covered with some background information on each prospect, along with how the Badgers fit in each recruitment at the moment.

Marcus Dumervil- Offensive Tackle (Class of 2020)

St. Thomas Aquinas (Fort Lauderdale, FL) offensive tackle Marcus Dumervil tweeted out his Wisconsin offer on Monday.

Per the 247Sports composite rankings, Dumervil is a 4-star prospect and ranks as the No. 21 offensive tackle and No. 141 overall player in the 2020 class.

Dumervil has already reeled in 26 offers, including from Louisville, LSU, Miami, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Clemson, Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Nebraska, Oregon, Penn State, Purdue, and Texas A&M.

While he will ultimately have his choice of most of the nation’s best programs, Louisville is one of the schools trending for him at the moment. Dumervil is the nephew of Elvis Dumervil, a former Louisville defensive end who went on to play in the NFL for the Broncos, Ravens, and 49ers. His cousin and former teammate at Aquinas, Demji Dumervil Jean, is a freshman defensive tackle for the Cardinals as well.

While Wisconsin will be hard-pressed to overcome that Louisville connection, not to mention all of those blue blood programs that are, and will be, involved in Dumervil’s recruitment, the Badgers have shown they can compete with some of college football’s best for offensive line recruits and should not be counted out here. In addition, one of Dumervil’s teammates at Aquinas is cornerback Semar Melvin, one of Wisconsin’s 2019 commits. Melvin wasted no time in getting a recruiting pitch in to Dumervil once he announced the offer.

Curtis Neal- Defensive Tackle (Class of 2022)

It is not often that you see Wisconsin extend an offer to a high school freshman, but that’s what happened on Tuesday with William Amos Hough (Cornelius, NC) defensive tackle Curtis Neal.

Wisconsin is Neal’s first scholarship offer at this very early stage in his recruitment.

The initial rankings for the 2022 class have not been released yet, so we can not yet offer a picture of where Neal stands with his peers from across the country. That being said, a recruit has to be a pretty special player to earn a Wisconsin offer so early.

With Neal’s recruitment really just beginning, it’s impossible to make any worthwhile predictions on the directions it could go. That being said, Wisconsin will have a few things working in its favor.

First, a recruit’s first offer can sometimes carry great weight for the duration of his recruitment, as there’s something to be said for being the first program to take a flier on a kid. The Badgers will always have that going for them. Second, the Wisconsin staff has established a nice connection at Neal’s high school, William Amos Hough. 2019 commit Gio Paez is Neal’s teammate on the defensive line, and Wisconsin at one time had a commitment from another teammate, wide receiver Nolan Groulx.

This will be an interesting recruitment for Badger fans to keep an eye on over the next few years.

Jake Majors- Offensive Tackle (Class of 2020)

Prosper (Prosper, TX) offensive tackle Jake Majors was offered by Wisconsin on Thursday.

Majors is a high 3-star prospect and currently sits as the No. 36 offensive tackle and No. 359 overall player nationally. He holds offers from Arizona State, Boston College, Colorado, Missouri, Stanford, Texas, and Washington, among others.

You get the sense that this will probably be a tough recruitment for Wisconsin to emerge victorious in. Majors’ offers from Stanford and Texas are particularly worrisome, though he will likely see some others come in from more top programs before all is said and done. Stanford, like Wisconsin, has had a great deal of success developing linemen, while saying no to the Longhorns can be pretty difficult for kids from the Lone Star State.

Myles Murao- Offensive Guard (Class of 2020)

Mater Dei (Santa Ana, CA) offensive guard Myles Murao was offered by Wisconsin on Friday.

The recruiting services love Murao. According to the 247Sports composite, he ranks as the No. 2 offensive guard and No. 40 overall player in the country.

Murao currently holds offers from programs such as Arizona State, Auburn, LSU, Michigan, Mississippi State, Oklahoma State, Oregon, UCLA, USC, Utah, and Washington.

There’s obviously a long way to go in the 2020 recruiting cycle, but Murao may be the least likely of the players mentioned in this piece to become a Badger. One of the very best players, at any position, in his entire class, he will continue to earn high-profile offers that will make it increasingly difficult for Wisconsin to stay in this thing.

That being said, Murao appears to be very aware of Wisconsin’s proud tradition of offensive line play based on his tweet announcing the offer. The Badgers have also had success recruiting at Mater Dei, one of the nation’s premier high school programs, in the past. In the 2015 class, the staff signed both Kyle Penniston and Olive Sagapolu from the school.

We will see if Wisconsin can stay relevant in this one moving forward.