Miles adds two to recruiting class

In one weekend, Les Miles tripled KU’s number of verbal commits for the 2019 class.

With 3* RB Cole Mueller already in the fold, Jayden Russell, a three-star DB out of St. Thomas Aquinas in KC Metro area, tweeted his commitment to KU. Russell was the top uncommitted prospect in the state of Kansas and the eighth-ranked prospect statewide, holding offers from Boston College, Duke, Iowa State, K-State, a few G5 schools (per 247Sports).

Kansas also picked up a verbal from TE Mason Fairchild out of Andale, KS. Fairchild currently has no rating by 247Sports and was previously committed to South Dakota. He also reportedly had an offer from Southern Illinois.

Both recruits talked about how Les Miles made the difference for them. Hopefully that will ring true for four-star LB Donte Starks, who took an official visit to Kansas this weekend as well. Starks is a top-150 player overall and the #7 linebacker in the country. He is currently committed to LSU and has an offer sheet 25 schools long, but sent this tweet on Saturday evening:

Obviously Starks would be a huge get and would really get people talking about Les Miles and Kansas football.

One more recruiting note: The Jayhawks also hosted three-star WR and K-State commit Keenan Garber, who is as local as you get coming out of Lawrence Free State. I’m guessing he’ll have Jayden Russell in his ear for the next couple of weeks trying to get him to flip over to the hometown Jayhawks.

The early signing period runs from December 19-21.