Florida may be using one unexpected angle to push for Easton Royal

This weekend was large in terms of the pure number of players who were in Gainesville for their official visit, but it was massive in terms of the actual players themselves who were in town. As we chronicled all weekend, five-star Jalen Brewster and Easton Royal were given the five-star treatment all weekend long as Florida is pushing hard to get both to flip from Texas Tech and Texas, respectively.

With Royal specifically, Florida pulled out every trick it could come up with during his photo shoots, but there was one photo he took and posted to Instagram that made everyone paying attention raise an eyebrow as to what Florida might have to offer that Texas and LSU, the two schools also trying to land Royal, don’t.

Easton Royal dons a track and field jersey as part of his Florida visit

On his own social media page, Royal showed a photo of himself wearing a track and field jersey as part of his photo shoot. While Royal is obviously being courted for his abilities on the football field, he could easily be a five-star prospect in the world of track and field if he solely wanted to focus on that.

Royal ran 10.17 seconds for the 100-meter dash this past season, and that wasn’t a one-off fluke as he also ran a 10.18 in April. To give an idea of just how fast that is, Neo Mosebi is a junior at FSU and just placed 11th at the NCAA Track and Field Championships, running 10.17 seconds. 

Royal did that as a junior in high school.

According to Steve Wiltfong of Rivals, Royal spent time with Gator legend and Olympic gold medalist Grant Holloway during his visit. There is no word on whether or not Royal would actually try to run track in college, but if he did, then Florida’s track and field team could be a hidden weapon in this recruiting process.

Mike Holloway, Florida’s head coach for track, is considered the actual GOAT on campus in Gainesville. He has won 14 national titles since 2010 between the men’s and women’s programs at Florida. On the men’s side, the Gators most recently won three straight outdoor titles in 2022, 2023, and 2024. On the women’s side, Florida won the outdoor title in 2022 and just finished as runners-up this past weekend.

Royal has been tricky to read because, based on his own social media posts throughout the weekend, he genuinely seemed to be impressed by what he saw. He commented to several insiders how he loved the energy that Jon Sumrall brought, and in a separate social media post, a photo with Sumrall with the caption “That MF guy.”

But given his commitment to Texas, along with his upcoming official visit to the Longhorns, and the fact that LSU is still looming in the picture, this race is a toss-up at best. But if Florida opens the door for Royal to run a few races with the Gators in the spring, could that be enough to get the Gators over the finish line?

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