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Message: [QUOTE="sutomcat, post: 5345198, member: 27"] Davis is an interesting story. It looks like he got about 500 yards in the regular season but in the playoffs, he got a ton of carries and added 800 more yards to his stats, as Iona Prep won a 'state championship' held among some of the NYS catholic schools. MaxPreps named him the NYS POY for his big playoff performance, which is shocking but standard for that organization. They named Ajani Shepard NYS POY in 2021. He had no offers from any good schools and was forced to enroll at Rutgers. In 2022, they named Dante Torres their NYS POY. Even Rutgers didn't want him and he ended up at Harvard (apparently an excellent student). In 2023, they named Rich Belin their NYS POY. He of course ended up at Syracuse, where he just enrolled. All these guys are good players but I don't think anyone knowledgeable would put them in the top 20 players in the state. They are barely top 20 players in their class. Why is MaxPreps doing this? Well, Shepard went to Iona Prep. Torres went to St Anthony's. Belin went to Cardinal Hayes and now this Davis guy went to Iona Prep. They are all in the same league of catholic HS in the NYS area and I think whoever is making choices for MaxPreps is in bed with that league. The thing that I find really interesting is that a few days before Crew Davis committed to UNC, a guy named Gary Merrill committed to UNC. Like Davis, for football and lacrosse. Merrill is a class of 2025 player so taking a verbal from him so late is very very unusual. It should be noted Merrrill also won a NYS POY award, this time the Gatorade award. Merrill is 6'1 185 pounds. Another guy who was thought to be destined to only play lacrosse in college. He had been verbaled to UNC for lax for a while. But Bellichek extended that offer to footblal as well. I think they offered him so they could say they got the NYS POY and hype up their program. I don't think Merrill had a football offer from any BCS level school. He ran for almost 2000 yards in 2024 and threw for 1700 plus. Another guy who padded his stats big time with big games in the playoffs against teams with bad defenses. His film is mostly him running options but his arm strength and mechanics need a lot of work. My opinion is that Merrill is a very good HS player but not remotely one of the top 20 football prospects in the state. I had him as the 81st best prospect in the 2025 class for NYS and I am going to stand with that. I wish him good luck in Chapel Hill. [/QUOTE]

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