On3 Recruiting Prediction Machine: Arkansas trending for RB Braylen Russell

Benton (Ark.) four-star running back Braylen Russell named his top five schools earlier this month: Arkansas, Baylor, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas A&M.

The one-time Razorbacks commit is narrowing down toward a July decision, but one program is trending in the On3 Recruiting Prediction Machine (RPM) right now.

The home-state Razorbacks have a 90.2 percent chance of landing Russell’s commitment per the RPM, following an expert pick from On3 national recruiting analyst Sam Spiegelman. Baylor (3.3%) and South Carolina (2.8%) trail behind.

Braylen Russell has longstanding connection Arkansas

The 6-foot-1, 225-pound Russell has known Arkansas running backs coach Jimmy Smith since ninth grade. And despite his decommitment from the Razorbacks last fall, they still have a very strong connection.

Smith is like “another family member” to him whenever he goes down to Fayetteville, according to Russell. And Arkansas is working hard to keep the four-star in-state.

“Their message is that the state school would take care of me very good,” Russell said. “I could be a big priority to their team and come play.”

Russell has official visits set up to South Carolina (June 2) and Baylor (June 9). He is also planning to take officials to his other three finalists.

He told On3’s Chad Simmons that there is a “little advantage” for Arkansas and Tennessee, since he has visited the Razorbacks around 10 times and the Volunteers a few times. However, he’ll likely take official visits to most, if not all of his finalists before a decision is made.

“The family feeling, someone I can just come to about my problems,” Russell said about what is important to him in a school. “You always want that person you can talk to because that’s really big to have. I’m really looking for somebody I can connect with. If I can connect with the staff, that means God’s leading me there.”