USC Football Recruiting: Four star wide receiver Puka Nacua signs with Washington

2019 has not been kind to the Trojans at the wide receiving position thus far. USC takes another hit on the recruiting end with another huge miss. Four star wide receiver Puka Nacua has committed to the Washington Huskies. The Orem, Utah prospect made his announcement on local NBC affiliate, KSL-TV late Sunday night. Nacua choices were down to USC, Utah, and Oregon.

Nacua is rated as the top recruit out of the state of Utah and is ranked as the No. 22 wide receiver in the 2019 class according to the 247 Sports Composite. At 6-2, 190 lb, Nacua reached over 2,000 yards during his senior season at Orem High School. The four star wide receiver also caught a lot of eyes during his impressive performance for the West team in the All-American Game in San Antonio, Texas and the Polynesian Bowl in Hawaii. Nacua is a huge get for the Huskies, who needed to grab another wide receiver in their 2019 class.

The commitment of Nacua to Washington stings for the Trojans. Nacua was a long time USC commit. He made his verbal commitment back in June of 2018. The commitment looked pretty strong after the Trojans hired Kliff Kingsbury to be their new offensive coordinator back in early December. Kingsbury departed for the NFL a month later which opened the door for Washington to make a push to flip the four star out of Orem. Given the time it took for USC to hire a replacement for Kingsbury followed by the departure of five star athlete Bru McCoy just weeks after signing with the Trojans played a factor in Nacua flipping his commitment.

USC ends their 2019 recruiting class with three wide receivers signed in five star Kyle Ford, four star dual athlete Drake London, and three star Munir McClain. The Trojans return Michael Pittman Jr., Tyler Vaughns, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Devon Williams, and Velus Jones. The addition of Nacua would’ve bolstered the depth at the recievers position as the offense makes their transition to the Air Raid under new offensive coordinator Graham Harrell. USC lost four wide recievers to transfers in Josh Imatorbhebhe, Randal Grimes, Trevon Sidney, and Bru McCoy.

The Trojans 2019 recruiting class now finishes at No. 20 in the 247 Sports composite rankings. This is lowest ranking USC received since 2001 when the 01 recruiting class was ranked No. 20. Recruiting classes started being ranked in 2000.