Stampede Bonus: 2025 USF Wide Receivers Breakdown
There are some big shoes to fill in the Bulls' WR room.
When we’ve finished profiling an entire unit, we’ll run through a final breakdown of that position group at large. We’ll touch on a quick overview of the group, then I’ll break it down by tiers as far as how I see playing time shaking out. Finally, I’ll pose one Big Question that I have about the unit approaching the season, and my general level of confidence.
If you missed any unit breakdowns, you can find them here:
The Overview:
Note: from left to right, the columns are player number, player name, eligibility, On3 consensus recruit rating out of high school (asterisk if the player transferred to USF), FBS snaps in 2024, career FBS games (with 2024 games in parentheses), career FBS starts (with 2024 starts in parentheses), catches, receiving yards, and receiving touchdowns in 2024, and school in 2024 (if not USF).
Here’s a fun game. Try to guess who these two players are.
- Player 1: 12 starts; 79 catches for 781 yards and two touchdowns
- Player 2: 12 starts; 75 catches for 918 yards and five touchdowns
Player 1 is Sean Atkins in 2024. Player 2 is… not a player at all, but is in fact the entire 2025 USF receiving corps, combined, in 2024. So every single receiver currently on this roster collectively put up about one (1) Sean Atkins worth of numbers last season. Yikes!
In addition to the legendary Atkins, USF loses Michael Brown-Stephens (379 yards in 2024), Abdur-Rahman Yaseen (254), and Josh Hardeman (140) - not to mention Naiem Simmons, who missed last season with an injury. In summary: USF returns just two of their top five receivers by yardage, and they lose both their all-time leader in receiving yards and their single-game leader in receiving yards.
And yet… why do I feel relatively OK about this unit? Let’s discuss.
The Prospectus:
Tier 1: Keshaun Singleton
Any discussion about the USF receiving corps begins with Singleton. His physical tools - a top speed of 22.4 miles per hour and a squat of 535 pounds - are eye-popping and earned him a spot on Bruce Feldman’s annual Freaks List. But it’s his on-field production that earns him a tier of his own on this breakdown: Singleton totaled 27 catches for 408 yards last season… but he did that over just seven games. Singleton didn’t play in the first five games of the season. Extrapolated over a full season, his yardage total would’ve been on pace for about 757. That would’ve been good for sixth all-time on the USF single-season receiving list, as you can see below.
I understand that we’re playing “what if” games here, but there are a lot of reasons to be excited. Singleton was basically option 1B to Atkins’ 1A during the second half of 2024, and now he gets the chance to be 1A over a full season. Any path to a top-tier Bulls offense almost certainly includes another leap forward from Singleton, and I’m pretty optimistic about the odds of that happening.
Tier 2: Chas Nimrod, Mudia Reuben, Josh Porter, and Jey’Quan Smith
I feel confident in Singleton as a locked-in starter. I don’t quite feel the same about this tier, but I think each of these players has a chance to start regularly, and should see a lot of playing time.
I was swayed by USF’s preseason depth chart to make a couple tweaks here. I originally had Chas Nimrod in Tier 1 as a locked-in starter, but he was banged up during fall camp and was the second name listed at one of the receiver positions (although he was still listed as a co-starter via the almighty “OR”. All hail OR). I still have very high hopes for Nimrod, who was a rotational player at Tennessee over the last couple seasons, but it doesn’t sound like he’s separated himself from this pack yet.
The other move came from CFB video game legend Jey’Quan Smith, who I’ve bumped up a tier after seeing him listed as a co-starter with Nimrod. Smith has gamebreaking speed and got behind the secondary on a few plays last season. I’d love to see a breakout year from him, especially since USF is in need of some help in the downfield passing game. He’s a bit more on the fringe than the other players listed here, in my opinion, but the coaches really seem to want to get the ball in his hands.
The other two players who I see in the mix are Stanford transfer Mudia Reuben, who the coaching staff has been hyping up all summer, and Josh Porter, who played nearly as much as Singleton did last season. They’re listed as co-starters on the depth chart - presumably in the slot - and should be in line for a lot of snaps. Coaches have raved about Reuben’s physical tools, but I’m equally excited to see Porter develop and try to fill Atkins’ shoes as the Bulls’ go-to possession receiver.
Tier 3: Brandon Winton, Jaden Alexis, Tyler Williams, Jeremiah Koger, Kory Pettigrew, and Christian Neptune
This tier is a bit of a jumble. I think one or two of these players should factor into the rotation, and there are decent arguments for each. My top pick of the group is Brandon Winton, who had a great spring game performance and was receiving a lot of praise from the coaching staff this offseason, but somewhat surprisingly didn’t feature on the Bulls’ first depth chart.
I was happy to see true freshmen Koger, Pettigrew, and Neptune all appear on the depth chart. Alex Golesh has given them multiple shoutouts in fall camp, and it sounds like they might see their first action sooner rather than later. It’s particularly exciting seeing Neptune - who suffered a foot injury during his senior year of high school - healthy and in the mix right away.
I’m unfortunately less optimistic about Jaden Alexis, who’s suffered two season-ending knee injuries now. I loved watching Alexis in 2023, and his speed and explosiveness would be a huge boost for this offense, but I think it’s best to keep expectations modest as he continues to recover.
Tyler Williams is a former blue-chip recruit, but he was considered a bit of a project out of high school. He’s only a redshirt sophomore, so he has time to develop.
Tier 4: Arkese Parks
Parks didn’t see the field as a freshman last season and hasn’t factored into the two-deep discussions in the summer, but he’s still got plenty of career ahead of him.
The Big Question: Who’s going to take the leap?
You’ll notice a running theme throughout this breakdown: potential. This could be a good unit. They might have a great season. To get there, the Bulls will need several players to take a leap that they haven’t yet taken in their careers.
As we discussed, there’s very little in the way of proven production here. I’m extremely high on Singleton, obviously, but I still had to create a thought exercise above revolving around a “Theoretical Keshaun Singleton.” Nimrod and Reuben are exciting additions, but we’re again operating in theory here: neither has eclipsed 200 yards in a season yet. Smith, Winton, and the true freshmen are all highly-rated prospects, but they’re young and haven’t played much, if at all, at the college level.
All that said… I can’t help but be cautiously optimistic here, for a few reasons:
- A changing of the guard. Losing Atkins is brutal no matter how you spin it, but the Bulls basically began turning over the roster at wideout about midway through last season. Veterans like Abdur-Rahman Yaseen and Josh Hardeman were slowly phased out in favor of younger players like Singleton, Porter, and Smith. The results were generally positive, and perhaps most importantly, gave the underclassmen valuable playing time. Those youngsters will be a year older and wiser in 2025, and will hopefully hit the ground running.
- A full season of Keshaun Singleton. As discussed above. I think Singleton could be a star for this team.
- More downfield threats. The Bulls’ downfield passing game was often… abysmal last season, to put it kindly. Atkins was an incredible receiver, but he wasn’t much of a big-play threat (9.9 YPC in 2024). Between Singleton (15.7 YPC), Smith (17.7, on a small sample size), there’s hope that some of the young receivers can provide some explosiveness in the passing game that the USF offense was dearly missing in 2024.
- Some smart portal adds. Between Nimrod and Reuben, there’s hope that USF pulled two quality starters out of the transfer portal, which is not easy to do.
Being optimistic about an unproven unit is dangerous, especially when we’re talking about a group losing GOAT-level production. But there are just enough promising options here that I’d like to believe one or two of them can make the leap and be a plus starter. If not, it could be another long season for the Bulls’ passing game.