Pitt Football Recruiting: Shakir Soto Commits To Paul Chryst For 2013

Paul Chryst picked up his third recruit for 2013 - Shakir Soto. Soto plays on both sides of the ball at GAR Memorial High School in Wilkes-Barre. Like recent Pitt commit, Aaron Reese, Pitt went for another versatile guy playing both offense and defense.

Last year as a junior, Soto led the team with 114 tackles and also had nine sacks. He reportedly had several BCS-program offers including Virginia, Maryland, Boston College, and Temple.

It's a little surprising that Soto didn't wait to see how his senior season played out. He had a few other big time schools on his list and at a recent combine, Pitt didn't come up in this quote from him (and disclaimer - he's wearing a Penn State sweatshirt in that link) about some schools in which he was interested:

"I am getting attention from a lot of schools," he said. "Some of them I like are Penn State, Rutgers, Miami (Fla.) and Syracuse."

Pitt apparently just offered him about a month ago (Insider Article), though, and ended up getting his commitment.

For Chryst, it's another guy they hope is under radar as he wasn't all that highly touted. See his current ratings after the jump.

Soto is unranked by both Rivals and Scout. 24/7 rates him as a three-star prospect, though. 24/7 also rates him as the 14th weakside defensive end in the nation and the 24th best recruit in Pennsylvania.

Of Chryst's three pickups so far, none are rated all that high. It's not a huge deal, though, since it's still really early. Many players want to see if a strong senior season will net them better offers and even the big-time recruits want to wait and take their time for the most part. And the fact that a few other big programs were sniffing around shows that this isn't a total reach.

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