Four-star recruit Ricky Parks places Pitt in top five

Pitt made significant headway with a coveted 2021 recruit late last week, as Ricky Parks, a standout running back out of Tampa, Florida, placed the program in his top five. The other four programs to make the cut for Parks were Florida State, Iowa, Utah and West Virginia.

Parks holds a four-star rating from Rivals, which ranks him as the No. 16 running back in his class, as well as a three-star rating from 247Sports, which ranks him No. 28 at his position in the 2021 cycle. He has drawn 21 offers during his recruitment, and the most notable interested programs no longer under consideration include Indiana, Iowa State, Kentucky, Louisville, Penn State, Purdue, South Carolina, Syracuse, UCF, USF and Virginia.

Last season, Parks attended Tampa Jesuit High School, where he rushed for 1,251 yards and 14 touchdowns in his junior season. For his senior year, he will move onto Gaither High School, just eight miles up the road from his former school. His residency in Tampa also makes his elimination of USF, his hometown school, a notable development. Currently, Florida State is the only in-state school still standing in Parks’ recruitment, and Pitt has excelled in the Sunshine State.

At this juncture, the 5’11”, 202-pound running back plans on taking official visits to each of the schools in his top five. His first visit will be to Iowa, and it is currently scheduled for the weekend of June 19. Parks has yet to officially set a date for a visit to Pitt.