When scanning over the University of Arkansas football roster, players mostly hail from states you’d expect.
Arkansas and Texas natives make up a good chunk of the team. A handful of Oklahoma, Louisiana, Missouri, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida and Illinois natives are scattered throughout. There’s someone from Mississippi and Alabama, as well as South Carolina, Ohio, Maryland and even California. The incoming recruiting class is more of the same.
Once the 2020 roster is finalized, Massachusetts will be added to the list.
Khari Johnson, a 6-0, 184-pound cornerback, is from Boston but played his final high school football season in Suffield, Conn., regions not exactly known for being college football recruiting hot beds.
“As a northeast kid, you have to work twice as hard,” Johnson said. “That’s why a lot of us that do end up making it out, we have such a big chip on our shoulders because we got something to prove.
“There’s a lot of ignorant statements that get said. It’s funny to me. People are like, ‘Oh, they play football up there? Like jokingly. But, yeah, it is tough, I will say that, it is tough for northeast kids to get some love. But in the past couple years, it seems that the country’s starting to take notice of a lot more of us up here, and it’s really exciting.”
Part of what helped Johnson gain more exposure was the strategic decision to leave Catholic Memorial School in the Boston area so he could play his senior season at Suffield Academy in Connecticut.
Suffield Academy, a private prep school, is located about two hours to the southwest of Catholic Memorial. Suffield is in the northern part of Connecticut, less than a half-hour’s drive from Hartford and an even shorter drive from Springfield, Mass.
“That league, it’s notorious for getting kids bigger looks for northeast [recruits],” said Johnson, a three-star prospect and Connecticut’s 16th-ranked overall recruit, per 247 Sports Composite. “A lot of kids up here, they know if you got some game, you go to [that league], and that league produces a bunch of talent.
“Me and my family, we felt like we had the confidence in my game and my ability to go show out in that league and let the cards fall where they may be, and thank God it worked.”
Johnson’s father, Bernard, believed his son needed to go play in a league with stronger competition to help gain more exposure from big schools, and Suffield Academy, part of the New England Preparatory School Athletic Council, provided that.
“It got to a point where I felt that Khari had performed at such an elite level that we definitely needed to get him in an environment to where day in and day out, every weekend playing those games, that he would be playing against the elite of the elite,” Bernard Johnson said. “It’s a school and a conference that is pulling from the best football players from the states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, [New] Jersey, Maryland — you’re getting to play against the best competition week in and week out.”
Before he started at Suffield, Johnson estimated he had about four offers, none of them from Power 5 programs.
By January, two SEC schools — Arkansas and Georgia — had entered into the picture, and one had already secured Johnson’s commitment.
“We knew we were getting a good athlete with a lot of potential, and his original high school film was good,” Suffield Academy Coach Drew Gamere said of Johnson. “I think with us, he just kind of took it to the next level, and he really evolved as a complete football player.”
Johnson was a standout on both defense and offense at Suffield in 2019. Gamere described Johnson as being a shutdown corner, a playmaker on both sides of the ball with elite ball skills, and a competitor.
Gamere, 46, who’s been the head coach at Suffield for 12 years, said the school has a history sending talented players to the next level. Among them is Christian Wilkins, the former Clemson star defensive lineman who was a first-round draft pick by the Miami Dolphins in 2019.
In Johnson’s class alone, Gamere said a total of five players are headed to Power 5 programs and a total of 12 will play college football.
“We’ve had a good run here,” Gamere said, “and I think that that helps in terms of exposure for any young man that’s gonna come in.”
It was on the morning of Dec. 18 — the first day of the early signing period — when Johnson said he received a call from Sam Carter, Arkansas’ cornerbacks coach. Johnson had taken an unofficial visit to Fayetteville in early November. Now Carter was calling to offer Johnson a scholarship to play for the Razorbacks.
“It was just the most overwhelming feeling of joy that I’ve ever had,” Johnson said. “I was forever grateful for him and to the Arkansas staff and Coach Pittman that were behind me on that.”
What sold Johnson on Pittman?
Many things, including Pittman being “a God-fearing man” and “a family man” in Johnson’s eyes.
“I can just feel it in the way that he’s talking and the vision that he has for this school is gonna be something special,” Johnson said. “And for me, coming from my background, I got a big chip on my shoulders, and I know he does too. And a lot of the incoming class, we want to prove a lot of people wrong and get this show on the road.”
Aside from Arkansas, Georgia was the only other major program that offered Johnson.
Johnson also held other offers from Arkansas State, Rutgers, Navy, Akron, Howard, Old Dominion, Rhode Island, Richmond, Wofford and Bryant, according to 247 Sports.
Georgia, Pittman’s former employer, didn’t offer Johnson until Jan. 20, two days after Johnson had verbally comitted to the Razorbacks. Johnson’s commitment came during his official visit to Fayetteville, a weekend highlighted by the Arkansas men’s basketball team’s home game against No. 10 Kentucky. Johnson was blown away by the atmosphere and fans inside Bud Walton Arena that day.
Less than three weeks later, Johnson signed with Arkansas on national signing day.
“I felt like throughout my recruitment I was severely under-recruited, and [Arkansas] ended up showing me love — an SEC school showing love to an East Coast kid, like that does not happen a lot,” Johnson said. “So for me, I felt like these dudes [were] willing to take a chance on me, that spoke volumes itself. And then on my visit, I enjoyed everything, I loved how the coaches interacted with me. So afterwards, me and my family, we just had a nice little family talk, and we really decided that — it seemed like it was written that Arkansas was the place for me.”
Now Johnson heads to a program that’s fallen on hard times, but it has new regime, led by Pittman, that hopes to guide the Razorbacks to brighter days.
“There has been some struggling in the past couple years, but when I go back and I watch film and when I go back and watch some of the games, I feel like Arkansas isn’t … too far behind as people think,” Johnson said. “It’s the little things that needs to be put together, and I feel like Coach Pittman can help establish a culture with us and the classes and the kids that are already there. I don’t feel like this process is gonna be as rough, but it is gonna be an all-hands-on-deck type of thing trying to turn this thing around.”