“It’s a phenomenal class.”
As National Signing Day passed on Wednesday without even a hint of its former fanfare, the Texas Longhorns officially signed the nation’s No. 1 recruiting class in 2025. No position group featured more star power than the wide receivers, earning Chris Jackson recognition as Rivals National Recruiter of the Year in his second cycle on the Forty Acres.
Jackson landed No. 2 wide receiver Kaliq Lockett out of Sachse, a consensus five-star prospect ranked as the No. 18 player nationally, according to the 247Sports Composite rankings, No. 9 wide receiver Jaime Ffrench out of Jacksonville (Fla.) Mandarin, Lucas Lovejoy standout Daylan McCutcheon, the No. 13 wide receiver, and the nation’s No. 1 athlete, Michael Terry III, out of San Antonio.
“It’s a phenomenal class, not only from a football perspective, I’m more excited about the type of people they are,” Jackson told Burnt Orange Nation at the Peach Bowl Media Day in late December.
“This is my second year trying to build a culture of guys that just buy into the culture that Coach Sark stands for, what he’s trying to preach. These guys all fit that — they’ve got great families, they’re great kids, humble, blue-collar kids that want to work, So I’m more excited about the type of dudes they are.”
It was a notable statement in the midst of Johnny Cook’s ongoing public meltdown that now includes his fast departure from Washington and recent arrest for property theft in Fort Worth.
The highest-rated departure of the Sarkisian era now stands as a stark testament to the importance of character in finding culture fits for a Longhorns program buzzing along at a high enough level to avoid taking those risks.
Texas is, after all, three long years and 33 wins away from taking a chance on Agiye Hall, to a quick, predictable outcome.
The rankings for Jackson’s four signees, all of whom are early enrollees, speak loudly to their physical gifts.
“I already know what type of football players they are. Now, they’re all a little bit different,” Jackson said.
Ffrench is the only out-of-state prospect in the wide receiver class, a one-time Alabama commit who reopened his recruitment following Nick Saban’s retirement. Texas surged quickly behind Jackson’s relationship-building efforts while returning to Jacksonville, where he spent one season as the Jaguars wide receivers coach before landing in Austin, landing Ffrench’s commitment in late August over Miami before holding off a late push by Florida before Early Signing Day.
“Jaime Ffrench being a national kid. Jaime, his body control, savvy, plays with different types of football speeds, his back-shoulder plays he’s able to make. Jamie is a little bit different in that realm,” Jackson said.
As a junior, Ffrench caught 62 passes for 1,247 yards and 14 touchdowns from Florida signee Trammel Jones Jr., but saw his production decrease as a senior after Jones suffered an injury, perhaps contributing to Ffrench dropping from a consensus five-star prospect ranked as the No. 4 wide receiver to a consensus four-star prospect ranked ninth.
The 6’1, 185-pounder’s polish and well-rounded skill set should allow him to compete for a spot in Jackson’s rotation as a true freshman.
The star signee is Lockett, a 6’2, 180-pounder with the speed of a smaller wide receiver and the ball skills of a bigger wide receiver.
“Kaliq is a different type of cat plays the majority outside at Sachse, but you’ve got speed, he has the ability to take the top end off of coverage, 50-50 catches, you know, kind of using his speed and the size on the outside,” Jackson said.
Lockett is known as relatively rare as a route runner, but his pure physical gifts make him a potential starter on the outside as a true freshman, joining Ffrench as the 2025 with the profiles to quickly pass some 2024 signees on the depth chart.
“Daylan McCutcheon can the play slot inside and out at different play speeds, great route runner, savvy, understands how to set up routes with his details in his route running, and play-making ability,” Jackson said.
A high school teammate of rising redshirt freshman Parker Livingstone, the 5’11, 177-pound McCutcheon broke out as a junior with 92 receptions for 1,430 yards and 20 touchdowns before going over the 1,000-yard mark again as a senior with 18 touchdowns on 89 receptions.
As Texas pursued a wide receiver trio of Lockett, Ffrench and the nation’s No. 1 wide receiver, Duncanville’s Dakorien Moore, McCutcheon committed to Florida State during these summer. But when the Seminoles struggled on the field after Moore committed to Oregon, Jackson increased the pressure on McCutcheon, flipping him in October.
With DeAndre Moore Jr. expected to be WR1 for the Horns in 2025 and the position room’s clear leader, McCutcheon will have a chance to develop behind Moore like Moore developed behind Jordan Whittington in 2023.
Terry is the pure athlete who projects as a hybrid offensive weapon in addition to favorable potential projections defensively. At Alamo Heights, Terry also played basketball and ran track and field, posting a sub-11 100-meter time at 6’3, 205 pounds. The natural ball skills and after-the-catch ability honed as a high-centered, upright running back make Terry a high-upside, versatile threat on jump balls, screens, or as an extension of the running game on jet sweeps, end arounds, or reverses.
As a junior, Terry recorded more than 1,500 yards from scrimmage with 30 total touchdowns.
Not only did Terry enroll early, he was able to practice with Texas in preparation for the Peach Bowl and the Cotton Bowl.
“We have him at receiver right now. It looks really good. I don’t know how he’s going to mature physically — he’s a big, long guy, very versatile, did a ton of stuff in high school. Seems very natural catching it and seems very natural with the ball in his hands. Again, I haven’t studied him. He’s doing a lot of scout team work for us right now,” Sarkisian said at Peach Bowl Media Day.
The sterling 2025 wide receiver class for the Longhorns cements Jackson as a recruiter who can win national battles to inject further talent into a position room that quickly set a standard for production and culture behind Xavier Worthy, AD Mitchell, and Jordan Whittington in 2023, a standard that Moore and Matthew Golden helped maintain this season.
It’s a fast ascent for Jackson, a 49-year-old who had a lengthy professional football career after playing at UC Riverside and Washington State — when Sarkisian hired him away from the Jaguars to replace Brennan Marion, Jackson only a year of experience as a defensive assistant for the Chicago Bears, two years as an assistant wide receivers coach for the Bears, and the year as an assistant in Jacksonville.
It was a calculated risk by Sarkisian, but also one that required completely projecting Jackson’s ability as a recruiter, in particular.
During the hiring process, Jackson’s Southern California background playing high school at powerhouse Mater Dei helped him connect with Sarkisian, a fellow Los Angeles native whose son played at Mater Dei. They also connected on their connections to pro-style offensive systems that Jackson believes prepares players well for the next level.
“To me, it’s learning a pro-style system, because the pro-style system will take care of itself, and it’ll all transition into being a good NFL football player, so you take that into looking at the three guys that we have coming in — they’re all different in that aspect of things and they all have aspects or a trait or quality that will transition to the NFL,” Jackson said.
Once Golden and Isaiah Bond are selected in this year’s NFL Draft, Jackson will have sent five Texas wide receivers to the league over two draft cycles. He won’t have any of his own signees eligible for the draft until Ryan Wingo in 2026, but based on the position’s trajectory, the 2025 additions have a chance to shape his room for years to come.
After all, the decision by the Longhorns staff not to pursue any wide receivers from the portal beyond Eric Singleton speaks volumes about how Sarkisian and Jackson perceive the players already on campus for winter conditioning.