USC Football Recruiting 2016: Where Class Ranks Pre-Signing Day

Exactly one week away from National Signing Day, Clay Helton and his staff still have a lot of work to do to make the USC football recruiting class of 2016 rise in the ranks.

National Signing Day is on Wednesday, February 3rd, leaving USC football with one week to take the class of 2016 from 13 commits to 20 signees.

As of this week, the Trojans’ highest class ranking by the four major recruiting sites is 17th. ESPN credits USC with ten 4-star and three 3-star recruits but no 5-star prospects.

On the other end of the spectrum, Rivals has USC’s class rated lowest at 28th in the country with one 5-star in Tyler Vaughns, eight 4-star and four 3-star players.

Meanwhile the Trojans hold the second-highest star average in the country on Scout at 3.92, just a fraction below Georgia’s 10th-ranked class. The overall class for USC, however, is a lowly 25th in the nation with 5-star prospects Vaughns, Wole Betiku and Michael Pittman not making up enough ground for the Trojans in such a small class thus far.

USC is still on the board for several top prospects, so the class will certainly have the opportunity to rise in the rankings over the next week. It’s just a matter of figuring out who will fill the seven open spaces.

Long Beach Poly cornerback Jack Jones, a 5-star, would certainly bolster the class, as would 4-star tight end Devin Asiasi, 4-star defensive linemen Connor Murphy, Boss Tagaloa and Maxs Tupai and 4-star safeties Brandon Burton and Kyzir White, all of whom are expected to consider the Trojans on Signing Day.

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The nation’s top prospect Rashan Gary recently visited and is considering the Trojans while top-rated JUCO defensive lineman Jonathan Kongbo is also on the board for USC as a potential major signing.

As always seems to be the case with recruiting, there are others who could surprise with a pick for the Trojans.

USC only has 20 scholarships to work with in this class because of blueshirts and transfers which allowed last year’s haul to balloon to 29 additions. Clayton Johnston and Deontay Burnett blueshirted while Taylor McNamara, Daniel Imatorbhebhe and Chris Tilbey took up an additional three spots in this year’s recruiting class when they transferred in.