Earlier this season, Coppell coach Antonio Wiley mentioned how hard it was to contain Sachse wide receiver Kaliq Lockett.
While Sachse lost 31-10 to Coppell in their Week 1 contest, Lockett finished with eight catches for 146 yards and a touchdown.
“We ran two people at him, we ran three,” Wiley told The Dallas Morning News after the game. “He’s a special talent, and that young man, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see him playing on Sundays.”
Lockett, the No. 2 player in The News’ top 100 recruits in the Class of 2025, is a five-star Texas pledge who holds at least 31 offers.
His large hands, 6-7 wingspan and ability to get contested throws makes him stand out from other high school wide receivers.
The wideout’s rating is the highest given to high school prospects, who receive grades typically between three and five stars from recruiting sites such as 247Sports, On3 and Rivals. These ratings factor heavily into a players’ college prospects, with the nation’s top programs vying for a share of four- and five-star recruits.
Independent scouts analyze recruits and assign ratings based on players’ film, performances during high school games or showings at specialized camps. High school prospects often tout their star ratings in their social media profiles.
But it’s unclear what criteria drives the star system — or if it can be trusted. Sites often have different ratings for the same players, athletes such as North Crowley star wide receiver Quentin Gibson can go unrated until their senior years, and not all top high school prospects find success in college.
“I don’t think it means[anything],” said Gibson, a three-star senior who committed to Colorado after receiving most of his roughly two dozen offers this fall. " You’ve still got to show me you’re a five-star, four-star, three-star.”
How the system works
The Dallas area boasts six five-star players in the Class of 2025, according to 247Sports’ Top 247 rankings: Sachse’s Lockett, Lewisville’s Michael Fasusi, Duncanville’s Dakorien Moore and Keelon Russell, Denton Ryan’s Ty Haywood and Mesquite Horn’s Lamont Rogers.
They are in elite company, as the recruiting site gives out only 32 five-star ratings across the nation per class.
“The top 32 are all five-stars to mimic the NFL draft,” said Greg Powers, the director of recruiting at Dave Campbell’s Texas Football who previously worked at 247Sports. “That’s their criteria for selecting a five-star.”
Powers said Dave Campbell’s gives players a five-star rating if they are ranked top 5 in the state. Players in the top 50 are given a four-star rating.
“It’s really a numerical-based system to differentiate between the five-stars and the three-stars. No. 1 is a five-star. No. 51 is a three-star,” Powers said.
Like 247, Dave Campbell’s considers a player’s NFL potential when giving a rating.
“What separates a five-star from the pack is that they are an elite talent that has dominated the competition. They project to be an early impact player in college who can be successful with an NFL upside,” Powers said. “If everything goes right, this student athlete could be drafted potentially in the first round.”
While a player’s professional upside seems like a common factor in determining their rating, Powers said each site has different criteria.
“They’re all unique, kind of like every recruitment,” Powers said. “Each recruitment is unique and individual and the way people do rankings is as well.”
Not a perfect science
Anthony Hill of Denton Ryan and Colin Simmons of Duncanville have been key contributors on a Texas Longhorns defense that ranks among the best in the country.
Both are underclassmen, Hill a sophomore and Simmons a freshman, and were five-star prospects out of high school.
Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons, a former five-star recruit who went on to be a first-round draft pick, said in a post on X that he’d like to see Dallas grab Hill in a future NFL draft. Simmons has also generated a lot of buzz.
But not every five-star recruit has fulfilled their potential at the college level.
Oklahoma’s Jackson Arnold was a five-star prospect out of Denton Guyer and the Gatorade National Player of the Year in 2022, but many Sooners fans questioned his rating amid his struggles earlier this season.
Meanwhile, Texas running back Quintrevion Wisner, a three-star product out of DeSoto, has been a force in the Longhorns’ offense this season.
There’s a method to recruiting rankings, but it’s also a guessing game.
“College coaches lose their jobs based on somebody’s rating system,” North Crowley coach Ray Gates said. “If you just look at that list and you don’t do your homework, you will end up recruiting guys that are highly talented, but that talent at times doesn’t translate to the next level.”
Gates said certain metrics can’t be measured, but colleges don’t always focus on the intangibles.
“They’re going to tell you, ‘We want kids to have this height, this wingspan, hand size to be whatever measurements that we’re looking for.’ All these different things, which are cool,” Gates said. “But sometimes … a kid just has it. And it has no measurements that you can put on him. You just know it when you see it.”
That’s how Gates feels about Gibson, who at 5-8, 165 pounds leads the Dallas area with 1,703 receiving yards and 30 receiving touchdowns. He has become a viral sensation, despite entering the season unranked with just three offers.
“You can’t contain him and put him in a box of what you want because it’s not going to add up,” Gates said. “He’s not one of those types of kids. It’s going to be exponentially greater if you can tap into what he is and utilize who God made him to be.”
On Twitter/X: @t_myah
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