Gamecocks land commitment from North Charleston defensive lineman
South Carolina has landed another piece of its 2022 recruiting class.
Three-star Fort Dorchester High School standout Demetrius Watson announced his pledge to the Gamecocks on Sunday evening via Twitter. Watson chose USC over reported offers from Arizona State, Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech, Syracuse and Georgia State.
The North Charleston native is unranked in the 247Sports Composite but is slotted as the No. 131 defensive lineman in the 2022 class and the No. 16 player in South Carolina in 247Sports’ in-house rankings.
Watson’s commitment comes one day after South Carolina eviscerated Florida 40-17 in the first big upset of the Shane Beamer era.
“Awesome. It’s the chance of a lifetime,” Watson said Sunday. “From what I saw last night, the team has come together excellently. The O-line was magnificent last night. Quarterback was pretty good. D-line was pretty good with pressure and some big sacks and nice hits.”
Speaking with reporters after the game, Beamer quipped about the slews of text messages he had from recruits regarding the atmosphere and win.
“Hopefully we’ve got a lot more games coming like this as well,” he said postgame. “... And we will if a lot of those recruits that were in that stadium tonight and the ones that are texting me on my phone — if they decided to come to (South Carolina), we’ll have even more fantastic nights than this.”
South Carolina currently has commitments from three other defensive linemen in its 2022 class in three-star Georgia product Felix Hixon, three-star Florida native Jamaal Whyce and three-star edge Bryan Thomas Jr.
With Watson’s pledge, USC has 18 commits in its 2022 class, including three players from South Carolina. The Gamecocks could add as many as six more players to this class as quarterback Zeb Noland currently counts toward USC’s annually allotted 25-scholarship total for next year.
South Carolina should get some added flexibility in the transfer market as well after the NCAA passed a one-year waiver in October on football scholarship limits in which programs are allowed to replace up to seven players who leave school after the first term without it counting toward their recruiting limits.
USC sat as the No. 21 class in the country and No. 8 in the Southeastern Conference according to the 247Sports team rankings prior to Watson’s commitment.
Watson first caught the eyes of Beamer and defensive line coach Jimmey Lindsey in camp last summer. From there, the relationship grew to the point it reached Sunday with the commitment.
“When I went up to camp there, they were talking about my size-to-speed ratio,” Watson said. “I’m pretty fast. I ran a five-second 40 on hand-time, probably about a 4.99 laser. Like my speed, I can use my hands for stuff like that. I don’t have to necessarily power rush the entire time. During the agility drills, I did awesome. And when we went to one-on-ones, that was my time to shine.”
Phil Kornblut contributed reporting for this story.
This story was originally published November 7, 2021 at 9:22 PM.
