The high school football season officially kicked off over the weekend as the state of Georgia was host to some of the best matchups in the country. One of those matchups involved two of the Tar Heels’ 2025 commits going head-to-head as 4✮ OT Alex Payne and 3✮ LB/EDGE Anthony Kruah met to start their senior seasons.
While the score, a 41-3 win for Payne’s Gainesville Red Elephants, may make you think that the higher-rated of the two prospects had a dominant performance himself, that wasn’t necessarily the case. Both guys had their moments especially when matched up against each other.
Payne, the No. 151 overall player and No. 15 offensive tackle in the 2025 class according to 247Sports Composite player rankings, played 46 snaps at left tackle for Gainesville before being pulled in the 4th quarter due to the blowout nature of the game. He was very impactful in run blocking throughout the night, registering three pancake blocks and getting good push all night on run plays. His pass protection reps weren’t nearly as consistent despite him only allowing one quarterback pressure. He was caught lunging a few times, which allowed the pass rushers opposing him to beat him to the inside and around the edge. The good news is, this is something that is easily correctable and will probably be pointed out to him by his coaches. There were a lot of other things to like, though, about what he showed on Friday night. His release off the offensive line looked clean and he showed how athletic he was with a very nice block in space on a screen play that was unfortunately called back and some pull blocks on RPOs. Overall, a solid start to his senior season.
Kruah, the No. 544 overall player and No. 56 EDGE in the class, had an up and down night himself. His first half was outstanding, as he racked up 2.0 tackles for loss and a sack prior to a long lightning delay during halftime. After the delay, he wasn’t able to shed blocks nearly as easily and was only able to register one tackle. He finished the night with three total tackles, two tackles for loss, one sack and two quarterback pressures, which is a nice start to his senior season. He did some good things off the edge throughout the night, but it’s clear that he doesn’t quiet have the speed or physicality to play edge rusher at the next level. With how good of a tackler he is and the way that he can shed blockers at time, he has the chance to be a successful off-ball linebacker at the next level, a spot it would be great to see him take more snaps at as the season progresses.
When it comes to the battle between the two, I would say it was pretty even with a slight advantage maybe going the way of Payne. The two matched up in a lot early, but Kruah was flipped to the other side of the line later in the game, meaning the matchups were limited between the two.
When it comes to their recruitments, Payne seems to be firmly locked in with the Tar Heels while Kruah is getting heavy interest from in-state powerhouse Georgia. On3 Sports’ Bulldog reporter Jeremy Johnson, who went and saw him in Marietta’s scrimmage last week, reported that he is “torn on what to do next” with the “heavy pursuit” that the Bulldogs have made. The Tar Heel staff has work to do to hold onto Kruah, their lone linebacker commit in the class.
Next week’s scouting reports will be extensive, as we’ll have one each on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday with a ton of great action in the home state and nationally. Our first two scouting reports of the week will be decided by you, the readers and listeners, with the polls below so make sure to vote.
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