By Keenan Cummings/For The Dominion Post
MORGANTOWN — While West Virginia defensive coordinator Tony Gibson couldn’t go into specific prospects, a quote of his stuck out when discussing the recruitment of a certain position.
“That Spur is really demanding, so it has to have certain things,” he said.
New West Virginia safety commitment Osita Smith meets those requirements and then some.
The 6-foot-2, 195-pounder, from Wilde Lake High School in Columbia, Md., picked WVU over a final group that also included Maryland, Indiana, Rutgers and Temple, but the Mountaineers had been the lean for quite some time.
For good reason.
After offering Smith a scholarship in April, the talented athlete made three trips to campus including two of those in a one-month span for the annual 7-on-7 passing tournament and then again for the annual Showtime Camp for elite prospects in July. During those trips he was able to sit down with the coaching staff and get a feel for how the program planned to utilize his skill set at the spur.
It was a near perfect match of position responsibility as well as skill set. An outside linebacker in high school, Smith displays the ability to set the edge in the run game, rush the passer and cover. All traits that are going to be necessities at his new spot in the Mountaineers defense.
“They like that I’m very athletic and I can move and cover,” he said. “Also I’m able to play in the box. The coaches think that I can be a great player at West Virginia.”
Running backs coach Marquel Blackwell, as well as safeties coach Matt Caponi and Gibson himself handled the recruitment of Smith and made the talented athlete a priority on the recruiting trail.
Smith becomes the 16th overall commitment for WVU in the 2019 class.
Keenan Cummings is the Senior Writer for WVSports.com with the Rivals.com/Yahoo Network.
