6 biggest winners from college football recruiting in July

Now that the calendar has flipped over from July to August, we look back at the six biggest winners in college football recruiting for the month. 

The month of July was one of the busiest in recent college football recruiting memory as tons of big-name prospects came off the board.

Arch Manning got things started in June and a number of other quarterbacks made decisions in July, plus a number of other five-star recruits in the 2023 and 2024 classes.

When determining the biggest college football recruiting winners from the month, we’ll look mostly at the 2023 class, which is given more weight (NSD 2024 is still a long way away).

We start our list with Texas A&M football, which is ironic because a few weeks ago they were among our biggest disappointments for the 2023 college football recruiting class.

At the time, we said that could easily change and expected the Aggies to get going at some point, but not as quickly as they did and that’s where we begin: Texas A&M football.

6. Texas A&M football

The demise of the Aggies was overexaggerated…greatly. Texas A&M football was a victim of its own success in some ways and some of the allegations seemed to be dragging the class down.

Who knows if that had anything to do with it or the NIL strategy not wanting to be as aggressive but A&M was ranked outside the top 60 for the 2023 college football recruiting team rankings not that long ago.

Yet, Texas A&M landed four of its top six commitments in July and the most important was five-star linebacker Anthony Hill, who is ranked 15th overall, first among linebackers, and second in the state of Texas.

That commitment changed everything in an instant. Plus, the Aggies have landed three top-100 pledges in the past week. Flipping four-star QB Austin Novosad is next up on the agenda, or flipping Notre Dame pledge Peyton Bowen.

The takeaway is that the Aggies can still land elite talent and by the time this class is completed, a top-10 group is well within reason, especially after a strong close to July.