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Elite 4-Star DE Sets Oklahoma in Official Visits

The Sooners are definitely in the mix for Nigel Smith, who set his visit dates on Tuesday.

John E. Hoover

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Nigel Smith, one of the top edge prospects in the 2024 recruiting class, has a date.

Six of them, actually, and he’s included Oklahoma among them.

Smith on Tuesday set his official visit dates for the upcoming summer recruiting push, and OU will host him on Jun 16-18.

He’s also planning to visit Rutgers (May 19-21), Ohio State (June 2-4), Penn State (June 9-11) and Texas A&M (June 23-25), and will visit Texas (Sept. 1-3) for a home game against Rice.

Just Monday, Smith announced his top eight schools, which included his six coming visits plus Georgia and Arkansas. He’s taken extensive unofficial visits, including reportedly four to Ohio State.

The 6-foot-5, 260-pound Smith is widely projected to pick the Sooners. According to 247 Sports and Rivals, OU currently leads for Smith’s services — which are prodigious.

At Melissa, TX, Smith has elevated his game to rank as the No. 10 defensive lineman in the nation and the No. 73 overall prospect in the country, according to the 247 Sports Composite rankings. Rivals similarly ranks Smith as the No. 75 player in the nation and the No. 9 strong-side defensive end.

Smith holds 37 total offers, including Alabama, Oregon, Tennessee and Notre Dame.

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John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

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