Florida Gators stocking up on recruiting needs, especially at quarterback

A year ago, Florida coach Jim McElwain capped his inaugural recruiting class with a flurried finish.

The Gators’ 2015 class was considered the weakest in the SEC heading into National Signing Day, but McElwain & Co., inked a pair of five stars and closed with a cornerstone class ranked No. 21 nationally, per 247Sports.

Tuesday’s NSD will be much less eventful, though.

The Gators have already welcomed a school-record 13 mid-year enrollees, as McElwain used UF’s momentum from a surprising 10-4 season — including a trip to the SEC Championship game — to secure as many early commitments as his roster would allow.

“We’ve got a bunch of guys coming in here. Just know, we’ve got some good guys coming. Lots,” McElwain said, as Florida currently has 26 commits in a class ranked No. 6 in the country. “Believe me, I’m excited as heck.”

Florida entered the offseason with a specific recruiting checklist: find a quarterback, some playmakers, restock the defensive line and add a kicker. Aside from some several public whiffs targeting blue-chip receivers, the Gators have cleared the board.

They signed their quarterback of the future in four-star early enrollee Feleipe Franks. They added additional depth at the position, too, with freshman project Kyle Trask and Purdue graduate transfer Austin Appleby.

Meanwhile, several of UF’s mid-year enrollees are considered instant impact performers, offering immediate upgrades at multiple positions of need. The influx of talent includes the program’s next potential headliner at corner (four-star Cocoa standout Chauncey Gardner), JUCO playmakers ‘Dre Massey (slot wideout, returner) and Mark Thompson (tailback), four-star wideouts Freddy Swain and Joshua Hammond and ballyhooed kicker Eddy Pineiro, a social media star who routinely posts videos drilling 60-yard field goals.

“You fit the pieces to the parts and the parts to what we’ve got to do,” McElwain said. “And change the carburetor a little bit and clean out the exhaust. … I can’t talk about anybody yet, I just know we got some good guys coming. Good things for the Gators.”

Although Florida ended the season on a dispiriting three-game skid, it hasn’t derailed much of McElwain’s recruiting momentum.

With just a few spots remaining in the class, Florida hopes to land a couple big-fish on NSD, notably American Heritage tight end Nick Eubanks, five-star cornerback Kristian Fulton and four-star wideout Tyrie Cleveland.

“I’ve got to think some of those shortcomings in some of those games, there’s probably some recruits [who] saw an opportunity to maybe come in and play at a pretty darned good place,” McElwain said on the Paul Finebaum Show earlier this month. “That momentum as we move forward, got to tell you, it’s a great time to be a Gator.”

This story was originally published January 28, 2016 at 8:00 PM with the headline "Florida Gators stocking up on recruiting needs, especially at quarterback."