Three-star TE Rawlings explains his decision to commit to UVa
Three-star tight end Josh Rawlings took four official visits right together with one clear goal in mind: He wanted to be able to contrast them as clearly as possible.
But there he was, sitting around with coaches from the University of Virginia when they turned the table on him a bit and began asking him questions. And among those questions was what he loved about his mom and uncle (who had accompanied him on his official visit) and why he played this game.
“No other school did anything like that,” Rawlings told CavsCorner about a half hour before announcing his decision to commit to the Wahoos earlier this week.
The 6-foot-6, 230-pound Pittsburgh (PA) Woodland Hills standout chose Virginia primarily over three others: Pitt, Vanderbilt, and Minnesota, schools he took official visits to recently.
So, why UVa?
“Ah, man,” he said with a laugh. “Where do I start? It had to be the coaches. That was honestly the biggest thing. When I got there, I thought it was going to be just any other official visit. But then we sat down for lunch and every single coach was in there when I walked in there, chopping it up and laughing with each other and they were just acting like they were all boys.
“It was like they were brothers,” Rawling added. “It didn’t seem like it was scripted, either. It was authentic.”
It was later in the day when, seated in a room with the entire staff, the initial questions went out to them before their harder ones came back toward him.
“They went around the room and talked about themselves,” Rawlings recalled. “So, I’m thinking it’s like an introduction thing. But then, it was like each coach challenged me in a way. They asked me questions, which I wasn’t expecting. One of them was what I love about my mom and my uncle, because those were the two who had brought me.
“They asked me why I loved to play football and honestly, I had never really thought about that stuff,” he added. “So, they challenged me to actually think about the reasons and questions and that just helped to show me they’re a family there and they care about who you are. And I think they wanted to see if family was important to me, too. They wanted me in that family and I loved the idea of being a part of it.”
Everything about Virginia’s coaches made him feel more comfortable and it just underscored the possibilities if he chose the Hoos.
“I haven’t seen that kind of authenticity with any other college,” he said.
With his size and skillset, teams could use Rawlings in a variety of ways. OC Robert Anae, who also oversees UVa's inside receivers, was very specific in how he outlined what UVa wants Rawlings to do out on the field.
“Coach Anae, the whole entire time that he’s been there he hasn’t [recruited] a scholarship tight end so they haven’t found a tight end that can play the position the way they want it played,” he said. "He showed me some cutups of how he has the tight ends split out wide and has them detach at the H-back position and also how he’d have me in the three-point stance.
“He said he loves my size and that I’m tall, too, because he loves tall tight ends,” Rawlings added. “He also really loved on my tape that I could block as well, my athleticism. They seem me as a dual-threat guy at that position in both the run game and the passing game.”
Coming to the point where he committed to UVa, then, felt like a foregone conclusion. But Charlottesville also helped to sell the school in a meaningful way.
“I wanted to take my four official visits together so that I could compare them the right way,” he said. “At the end of the visits, I was thinking that I really wanted to go to a college town instead of being in a city where the college was, if that makes sense. So, Minnesota? City. Pitt? City. Vanderbilt? That’s also more of a city. I just felt more comfortable in a college town and for me, since it really came down to Pitt, Vanderbilt, and UVa, I knew I was leaning toward UVa because I wanted that college town feel.”
As he moves ahead, being done with the recruiting process is not something that Rawlings has any issues with.
“Oh my goodness, man,” he said with a laugh. “It’s a breath of fresh air, I’m not going to lie. I feel bad in a way, though. Because a little while ago, 25 minutes or a half hour, I had to call one of the other coaches and tell them I wasn’t going to Pitt. And I could tell the tone in his voice that he wasn’t that thrilled.”
Even though he had to make that call, he knows within himself he made the right decision for him.
“You’ve got to put your big boy pants on,” Rawlings said, “and eventually you have to choose and I did. I’m so excited.”
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