Four-star recruit Aamil Wagner, brother of former UK star, commits to Notre Dame
Aamil Wagner, one of the country’s highest-ranked offensive line recruits and believed to be a Kentucky lean prior to his announcement, committed to Notre Dame on Thursday.
Wagner announced his decision during a live broadcast on CBS Sports HQ, a streaming platform, and picked the Fighting Irish over UK, Ohio State, Penn State and Maryland.
The Dayton, Ohio, native is ranked as the No. 116 player in the country by 247Sports, which tabs him as the 11th-best offensive tackle in the 2022 class. Rivals has Wagner ranked as the No. 202 player in the country and the No. 23 offensive tackle. Both services consider him to be a four-star prospect.
Prior to Wagner’s commitment, 247Sports analyst Chris Singletary likened Wagner to Miami Dolphins offensive tackle Austin Jackson. He was a wide receiver through his freshman season of high school, and his athleticism at the tackle spot is his most well-regarded attribute.
“When you look at offensive tackles who go on and do well at college and in the NFL, a lot of them look like him,” 247Sports national analyst Allen Trieu said. “ ... I think the ceiling is almost unlimited.”
Wagner is the brother of former UK receiver Ahmad Wagner, who played two seasons for the Wildcats’ football team after initially starting his collegiate career as a basketball player at Iowa. Aamil, like Ahmad, is tall — he’s listed at 6-foot-6 — and checks in at about 265 pounds. Ahmad is now a graduate assistant on Kentucky’s staff, and their sister Amani is a discus and shot-put thrower for the track-and-field team at Kentucky State, which is in Frankfort.
Kentucky wasn’t on Aamil’s radar before Ahmad joined the team. He was in eighth grade at the time, and had gotten familiar with the program during its best stretch of the modern era; UK earlier this year qualified for its sixth straight bowl appearance, a school record, and has a chance to finish with double-digit victories for the second time under Mark Stoops.
“I grew up watching the Big Ten, so I didn’t have a chance — besides basketball — to get to know Kentucky at all before then,” Aamil told the Herald-Leader over the summer. “The opportunity to be around Coach Stoops and Coach (Vince) Marrow, to develop those relationships and get that first-hand insight from Ahmad early on really helped a lot.”
Those connections ultimately didn’t lead to a commitment for Kentucky, which has three offensive linemen committed as part of the 2022 class, including Kiyaunta Goodwin, a five-star prospect who’s on track to be the top-rated recruit signed during Stoops’ tenure.
Johnson Central’s Grant Bingham, who projects as a guard at the next level, is a four-star recruit. Nikolas Hall, a three-star offensive tackle out of Texas, is the son of former UK star Antonio Hall.
Kentucky’s 2022 class ranks No. 16 and No. 20, respectively, on 247Sports and Rivals.
This story was originally published November 11, 2021 at 2:20 PM.
