Texas Lands Five-Star Tyler Atkinson, flips Georgia commit James Johnson

Texas went 0-2 against Georgia on the football field in its first season as an SEC program, but the Longhorns are proving a worthy challenger on the recruiting trail by scoring a pair of Top 100 commitments directly under Kirby Smart’s nose on Tuesday afternoon while Steve Sarkisian and three of his players, including Arch Manning, were at media days in Atlanta. 

Five-star linebacker Tyler Atkinson, a national top 10 player from Grayson, Ga., pledged to the Horns over the Bulldogs on Pat McAfee’s show on ESPN. The 6-2, 210-pound Atkinson is the top-ranked linebacker in the class and the ninth-best player in the 2026 cycle, per the 247Sports Composite ranking.  His 50 reported offers a are a who’s who of college football. On paper, he’s the predecessor to Anthony Hill Jr.