Recruits in for Alabama junior day leave Tuscaloosa buzzing about the new staff.

Kalen DeBoer and the new Alabama staff had some talented prospects on campus for junior day on Saturday.

And these blue-chippers are strongly considering a future in Tuscaloosa.

“The experience was everything I could ask for on an informative, academic scale, and relationship standpoint!” Atlanta (Ga.) Westlake Top247 receiver Travis Smith Jr. said. He is being courted by the top programs in the country and was offered by the Crimson Tide during his visit.

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Official game thread: Alabama vs. Mississippi State
Kirk and I have set up in Coleman Coliseum for tonight’s game. Let’s get it started.Tip: 7:30 p.m. CTTV: SEC
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Georgia’s big recruiting event has come and gone. That means the Bulldogs’ contact period is mostly complete.

It was a resoundingly successful month of relationship building for Georgia, even if the public commitments will have to wait a bit. Coaches were on the road, and they hosted two big recruiting weekends. They also had some other top targets scattered throughout the month.

This final junior day gave the Bulldogs a chance to make some major out-of-state impressions and figure some things out at major positions of need (see: quarterback).

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We answer the following questions in this edition of Stay Wolk:.

What was on the schedule for recruits?
Who got to sit with Kirby Smart at Stegeman?
Where do things stand with those recruitments?
What did visitors have to say coming out of the trip?
What are the early social media reactions?
Here’s a review of the list of prospects Georgia is expected to have on campus for the recruiting event.

Let’s hop into the notebook to breakdown what we’ve learned from the Bulldogs’ junior day.

There will be plenty more content coming out of the weekend from Dawgs247 and 247Sports.

WHAT WENT DOWN AT GEORGIA’S JUNIOR DAY

(Photo: Shotgun Spratling | USCfootball.com, 247Sports)
Georgia’s second junior day of the year looked a lot like its first. Prospects arrived in the morning, which gave the Bulldogs ample time to run them through the various agenda items they had set aside for them Saturday. Like the last visit, players were split into offensive and defensive meeting rooms. Mike Bobo and Glenn Schumann led the sessions for their respective units. Offensive sessions focused on the pro-style offense. Defensive sessions focused on player development. Both sessions ended with videos highlighting plays Georgia players made in Athens translating to nearly identical plays they made for their NFL teams. Multiple recruits from both recruiting visits made a point to call out how much that resonated, including the big-time quarterback on campus. Needless to say, a few plays made by Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint, Ladd McConkey, and Tykee Smith were brought up by coaches to prospects on campus Saturday. Recruits went through the obligatory photoshoots (still allowed on unofficials until the spring) and took nutrition and strength and conditioning tours to get a sense of what the day-to-day facility experiences are like. From there, everyone flocked to Stegeman Coliseum for the basketball game against South Carolina. It gave players more relaxed time to hang out with other recruits and talk to Georgia coaches.
Aside from the primary recruiting section, Kirby Smart also has his lower-level seats, which were saved for priority recruits and their families to get some 1-on-1 time with Smart throughout the game. Players who Dawgs247 confirmed got to spend some personal time with Smart throughout the basketball game: quarterback Julian Lewis, offensive lineman Nick Brooks, running back Bo Jackson, and 2026 defensive lineman Xavier Griffin. There may be other recruits who had a chance to sit with Smart throughout the game, but those are the ones we confirmed.
After the game, recruits returned to the facilities for final conversations and goodbyes. Smart also held some 1-on-1 sessions after the basketball game with recruits before they left campus. That included a couple of targets from Alabama in edge rusher Zion Grady and linebacker Eric Winters, though there were likely more.
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MORE ON THAT PERSONAL TIME WITH KIRBY SMART

(Photo: Dale Zanine, USA TODAY Sports)
Lewis was the one that probably warranted the most attention from Smart and certainly will from Georgia recruiting readers. The USC commit is a major priority for the Bulldogs, and he and his father got a chance to take in the atmosphere with Georgia’s head coach. He and his father spent much of the first half with Smart. They were also accompanied by Lewis’ high school teammate and wide receiver, Ryan Mosley, in the 2026 class. We are still working to get details about how this visit went and what it means for overall recruitment. Mike Bobo and Montgomery VanGorder were, as expected, key recruiters on this visit. That’s who Lewis and his father spent most of their time with when not with Smart. Lewis had a pretty interesting quote from Steve Wiltfong in his visit overview from a national lens here.
Brooks is every bit of his 6-foot-7 listing. The Iowa offensive lineman played for Buford before returning home, and a couple different sources have said he’s one of Georgia’s favorite offensive tackle options in the 2025 class. When he wasn’t with Smart during this visit, he spent a lot of time with Stacy Searels. He and his family also got a chance to do some chatting with former Georgia offensive lineman Warren Ericson, who’s back with the program as a graduate assistant and helping out with recruiting. The proof-of-concept of a guy like Ericson having a career launching point at Georgia post-playing career is a powerful message for the Bulldogs to flex.
We’ve been trying to shore up what Georgia’s running-back recruiting board looks like and who’s most likely to join Bo Walker. Well, Bo Jackson would be the most fun name combination for the Bulldogs. It seems there’s more to it than that. He spent some time with Smart on Saturday, and to make the trip down from Ohio State means there’s a lot of mutual interest there. Ohio State will be tough to beat, but Georgia sees Jackson as a national target worth fighting for.
It’s interesting, to say the least, that Griffin picked up a recent offer; Georgia coaches went to see him play basketball, and now he’s getting basketball game time with Smart. Needless to say, Griffin is a major name to know for the 2026 class, and knowing what I know now, he’s probably someone who should’ve been included in this article from Friday.
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QUICK HITTERS WITH GEORGIA RECRUITS AFTER VISIT

Darren Ikinnagbon (Photo: @AceSZNF)
We will have more in-depth conversations with a lot of these guys, and there will be plenty of other conversations we haven’t had the time to have yet, but here’s a quick quote from some of the top players that have already chatted with Dawgs247. We have plenty more conversations coordinated when they return home.
2025 QB Julian Lewis to Steve Wiltfong: “I don’t think any of us realized how productive the offense has been over the last two years.” This was an incredibly notable quote. I was told last fall when Lewis attended Georgia for the Ole Miss game that the offensive performance made him reconsider how he views the Bulldogs’ offense. It sounds like that trend is trending even more in the right direction after Saturday.
2025 EDGE Darren Ikinnagbon to Steve Wiltfong: “They rank in the top three for real. The atmosphere is different. It’s crazy out here.” Ikinnagbon is up there with Jared Smith, Bryce Davis, Isaiah Gibson, and Justin Hill as priority edge targets in this class.
2025 WR Jamauri Brice: “What stands out to me about them? I want to say it’s the player development they have. They have attention to detail to get better.” This was a big first visit after the offer, and I would expect Brice to return to Athens for a spring practice in March or April. Brice got a chance to spend some time with Cartersville (Ga.) teammates and Georgia early enrollee Malachi Toliver while on the visit.
2026 DB Dorian Barney: “I was able to meet the new DB coaches, and they both seemed cool.” Barney is someone who will be on offer watch once Donte Williams and Travaris Robinson have more chances to meet with him and evaluate. They’re still getting a firm grasp on the 2025 board before they turn full focus to 2026.
2026 WR Nalin Scott: “Some takeaways from my visit today were the hospitality I felt from everyone I talked to, no matter if it was a coach to the recruiting directors. Everyone had an amazing approach to everything.” He had some time to do a photoshoot and chat with Smart with his family briefly.