Nebraska has been looking for reinforcements to its secondary for months now and it found a key piece.
Arizona State transfer Tommi Hill, a longtime target of the Huskers' originally from the 2021 recruiting class, gave his verbal pledge to NU on Monday evening.
Hill (6-foot and 205 pounds) is an Orlando, Florida, native whom Nebraska recruited heavily last year. He had the Huskers in his top five and was set to take a visit to Lincoln in the spring of 2020, but then COVID-19 caused a year-plus shutdown and Hill ultimately chose the Sun Devils.
In the 2021 class, Hill was ranked the No. 233 player overall in the country by 247Sports and was also a four-star player according to Rivals.Â
Now, though, he'll end up at Nebraska after all.
Hill has three years of eligibility remaining plus a redshirt. According to ASU stats, he appeared in 11 games for the Sun Devils this year and recorded a total of nine tackles. According to Pro Football Focus, Hill played 59 snaps defensively and 99 snaps on special teams over the course of his first collegiate season. He started one game, in September against Colorado.Â
Hill played his high school ball at Edgewater High at Orlando, where he first found himself on Nebraska's radar screen. Much of the Husker staff, including secondary coach Travis Fisher and defensive coordinator Erik Chinander, of course, coached at Central Florida in Orlando and Fisher is a UCF graduate.Â
It's a significant addition for the Huskers for multiple reasons. In 247Sports' new transfer portal rankings, Hill as of Monday evening was considered the No. 21 available transfer nationally regardless of position and the third-best defensive back.Â
The Huskers must replace three starters in the secondary in corner Cam Taylor-Britt and safeties Deontai Williams and Marquel Dismuke. They've got young players they like — in particular safety Myles Farmer and corner Braxton Clark — but also have seen three other young players transfer out in the past 18 months. As such, a young transfer in addition to the high school 2022 class is seemingly an ideal scenario.Â
Nebraska is also squarely in the picture for junior college transfer safety DeShon Singleton (Hutchinson Community College) who, like Hill, has played just one collegiate season.Â
RB Hayes decommits: Ashton Hayes, the Class of 2022 prospect from Reno, Nevada, is no longer planning to sign with Nebraska. He instead will sign with California, his coach, Jim Snelling, confirmed to the Journal Star on Monday morning.Â
Hayes was primarily recruited by running backs coach Ryan Held, who was one of four offensive assistant coaches fired by Husker coach Scott Frost last month.Â
Defensive line coach Tony Tuioti, who recruits the West Coast for Nebraska, visited with Hayes shortly after the season ended, but it's not known if Frost ever made it to Reno to see the running back.Â
The Huskers hosted Minneapolis running back Emmett Johnson on an official visit this weekend and offered him a scholarship in the process. He has not yet announced his college intentions, but National Signing Day is Wednesday and Nebraska is his lone Power Five offer at this point.
With Hayes out of the class, Nebraska has 10 verbal commitments for 2022 at the moment.Â
When Hayes first verbally pledged to the Huskers in the summer, the other main suitor in his recruitment was Cal. He told the Journal Star then that the reason he picked Nebraska is because of the different ways Held had in mind to use him in the Husker offense.
Nebraska's offense is, at the very least, now going to be retooled for 2022 under new offensive coordinator Mark Whipple. Not only that, but at the moment the Huskers don't have a full-time running backs coach, or at least haven't announced the hire of one.Â
A portal punter?:Â The Huskers on Monday also offered a newly minted transfer portal punter option from a familiar FCS school.Â
The University of Montana's punter, Brian Buschini, has had an active Monday. He was named the FCS punter of the year, entered his name into the transfer portal and picked up a scholarship offer from Nebraska all within a span of about three hours.Â
Blessed to have received my first Full scholarship offer from
— BRIAN BUSCHINI (@brian_buschini)
Buschini, a Helena, Montana native, averaged 46 yards per punt during his redshirt freshman season for the Griz. According to , he had 28 punts of 50-plus yards, pinned 30 inside the 20-yard line in 69 attempts and recorded only four touchbacks. Buschini also handled kickoffs for Montana this fall. He has three seasons of eligibility remaining.
The turning point in every Nebraska football game in 2021