It’s one of those things that was never a thing, the unofficial unofficial visit. But now, at a time when the NCAA has closed down real visits until at least the end of the month, players are doing what they can and that includes coming to “visit” schools on their own. They drive or walk around and they see what they can see without ever meeting with coaches or walking inside facilities.

A recent such visit to UVa has helped three-star OL Jack Leyrer, who following a similar trip to Stanford will then make his decision.

The 6-foot-7, 280-pound lineman was in Charlottesville with his family and left impressed. It was another in a string of positive developments which have helped him make the most of a tough situation.

“It's been good and I’ve really enjoyed the process,” Leyrer told CavsCorner. “It's great to have people that that they want to offer you scholarships that have up to $250,000 in value, which is pretty crazy. So, yeah, I’ve really enjoyed it. It's been it's fun. But I think I'm getting closer to committing. I think it will probably happen definitely before the season, just based on what the COVID restrictions have brought upon us.”

After picking up his first offer from SMU, things go going for him in February. He had no idea then, though, that COVID-19 would rearrange his recruitment.

“At the beginning there, it was pretty steady,” he recalled. “But then when COVID hit, people weren’t able to come out and evaluate us in the spring. But then it heated up a lot during the quarantine and being at home, that’s when I picked up the majority of my offers. It got a little crazy there for a little while. Like I said, I’ve enjoyed it and it’s been a fun process.

“I think I was definitely going to try to take all five of my official visits and then probably try to take some unofficial visits too if I needed them,” Leyrer added. “I think I’ve gotten it to a point where it’s very manageable now. I think I’ve got it down to seven or eight schools that I think have real potential and are in the right place for me. So, it’s going to be one of those.”

In some ways, the extension of the dead period has allowed recruits like Leyrer to move forward with some semblance of confidence since they know “real” visits are unlikely to happen.

“Yeah, I've come to that realization,” he said. “I mean, when they closed down August for that period, I kind of had the realization that ‘Yeah, it's going be virtual and if I want to take a visit, it's going to have to be unguided and by myself with my parents.”

Led by O-line coach Garett Tujague, UVa started recruiting him in the spring and the relationships with the staff have been easy to come by.

“I love Coach Tujague,” Leyrer said. “He's a great guy. He's a really solid person. I think that the whole UVa coaching staff is probably one of the closest in all of college football. I mean, just from that background story and them coming from BYU and what was it, like 14 of them and they all came with Coach Mendenhall. I think that was just awesome. So, those guys are all great dudes.”

The virtual tours he did helped him prepare for what he would see once he arrived on Grounds.

“Yeah, I mean, I've done a ton of stuff,” the Dallas (TX) Highland Park standout said. “I kind of like to check all of the boxes with all the schools. I think I've probably done a virtual visit with everybody. They've walked around campus with me on FaceTime. I've done calls with somebody in the admissions department and then another person that works in the business school. So, I've checked a lot of boxes with UVa, getting all the information that I can.”

That information gathering, as one might expect, is better some places than others.

“I mean, there have been better ones,” he said with a laugh. “I've had better virtual visits with some than others. But I mean, it's pretty borderline. I mean, they're all pretty much going over the same things and there's not really too much they can do differently. They kind of just go over the school, they go over pictures of the locker room, here's this, here's where you'll be eating, here’s where you'll be sleeping. I mean, it's kind of rudimentary but it's still pretty cool. For me, it is what it is and it’s the best that we can do right now.”

In concert with those virtual tours and meetings, visiting UVa for himself helped him get a great sense of what the school truly had to offer.

“Yeah I went to UVa and then went to Northwestern and then to Vanderbilt,” he said. “I think that'll pretty much wrap up the kind of places where I want to go see.

“I loved it at Virginia,” Leyrer added. “I loved the college town feel. I think the town is awesome. We went up to Carter Mountain at the end and got to see the whole thing from an aerial perspective, which was pretty cool. I loved the campus, I loved the historical feeling of it. It’s just awesome. I got to see the stadium and how cool that was. So, it was a really good time and great experience overall.”

Tujague was instrumental in making sure the Leyrer family got to see as much as possible.

“We got a little packet with a walking tour and it had a bunch of dots on it, like 1 through like 15, of things to do and see,” he said. “And then all of the dots were detailed out, explains what you're looking at and here's how this is going to affect you. It was cool how they did it.”

As the end of his recruitment draws near, Leyrer doesn’t carry the same sense of pressure that other guys typically do.

“I honestly think the most relieving thing was getting this ACT taken,” he said. “So that was probably the most relieving thing to get done with. But now, I mean, I’m kind of on the verge. I've enjoyed the process. It hasn't stressed me out. It hasn't been difficult up to this point. So yeah, I mean, not really but to a degree? Yes.”

So what’s he looking for as he evaluates the various schools?

“The borderline would be great education and great football,” he said. “I mean, that kind of cuts the list down significantly. And then it comes to like distance from home, and I don’t mean just distance necessarily but the ease to get home. That's one thing. And then the relationships with the coaches. Who are the people in the locker room? What’s the living together, that kind of thing. It comes down to a lot of different factors.

“At a certain point education becomes so common and you’re comparing apples to apples, if everybody's at such a high level, then it gets a little crazy because it's just so many good options,” Leyrer added.

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