Want to attack every day with the latest Georgia football recruiting info? That’s what the Intel will bring at least five days a week. The rundown for Monday night looks at a recent visit from a massive offensive lineman from Alabama. Amari Kight, a 4-star recruit, breaks down what he likes about Athens.
Amari Kight fits the new standard for a Georgia offensive lineman. The 4-star recruit from Thompson High School in Alabaster, Ala., has the size needed to line up at tackle for the Bulldogs.
Does that mean he sometimes needs to tilt his head just a bit when he goes through doorways?
Well, yes it does. That goes hand-in-hand these days with a 247Sports composite ranking that places Kight as the nation’s No. 15 tackle and as the No. 108 player overall for this cycle.
He stood 6-foot-6 and tipped the Butts-Mehre scale at 305 pounds during his visit Saturday.
That trip isn’t likely to be his last one to the 706 area code.
“It was really fun,” Kight said. “It was a great experience.”
He picked up his first SEC offer from Mississippi State during the summer of his sophomore season. His profile on 247Sports now lists 21 offers.
Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, LSU, Michigan, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas A&M and Tennessee are some of those heavy hitters who have offered him.
He plays left tackle for his high school, and Georgia line coach Sam Pittman shared his evaluation with Kight about where he could should play in college.
“Coach Pittman told me that I am definitely a tackle,” said Kight, who was accompanied by his parents on the trip.
He laughed when asked how hard the Bulldogs have been recruiting him since they offered him in January but then gave “really hard” as a reply.
“I wouldn’t say that anybody recruits me harder than them,” Kight said about UGA. “But it is about the same for a couple of the schools.”
Kight said Alabama, Auburn, LSU and Oklahoma are recruiting him with the same intensity as Pittman and the Bulldogs.
What Amari Kight likes about UGA
The 2017 season caused Kight to look at the Bulldogs differently.
“They kind of asserted themselves as a powerhouse program,” he said.
Kight said he thinks he will make his college decision after his senior season of high school football. He’s not sure if he can enroll early, but he might look into that. He said he hopes to pursue engineering as his future college major.
On the field, he likes pass protection but has an affinity for another discipline with his position. He really likes plowing the way for the run game.
“I just really like hitting people,” he said.
The 4-star tackle also enjoys talking to Pittman during this recruiting process.
“He’s goofy, but he will be honest with you,” Kight said. “He told me that if they weren’t interested in me, then I wouldn’t have been there [for his visit] on Saturday. We just talked for a while.”
Naturally, Pittman also found a way to interject some humor into those idle recruiting moments.
“He told me if I did ever decide to go to Georgia then he would try his best to do a backflip,” Kight said.
But in a more serious moment, he said Georgia is building something impressive. The Bulldogs signed the No. 1 recruiting class for 2018, which should suit Kight’s desire for competition.
“I want to go somewhere that I can compete against the top competition and where I think I can get better,” he said.
It traditionally is very hard for any other SEC program to go into neighboring Alabama and pry away a player wanted by both Alabama and Auburn.
How hard might this be?
“I don’t think it will be too hard to leave,” Kight said. “I just want to go wherever I feel that I find that I fit in the best.”
Kight said the Bulldogs helped themselves significantly during his weekend visit.
“There was the time I got to spend with some of the coaches and there was a big focus on the academic side and not just the football,” he said.
Coach Kirby Smart also had a message for him.
“He told me that he wanted me and they were going to be recruiting me hard,” he said.
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