2025 Football Target Desmond Straughton Speaks with WV Sports Now

2025 West Virginia football target Desmond Straughton spoke with West Virginia Sports Now after being offered by West Virginia this past week.

“I like West Virginia for real, for real,” said Straughton. “I like coach Wright. He came to the school onetime and I just loved West Virginia from that day. He was talking to me about some stuff and I know somebody who went to West Virginia and just watching those practices on Instagram, it just seems very energized.”

Straughton is a 5-foot-11, 175-pound athlete from Roseville, Michigan. He currently has eight offers from Akron, Arkansas Pine-Bluff, Bowling Green, Eastern Kentucky, Indiana, Kentucky, West Virginia and Western Michigan. West Virginia was his fifth offer and his third power-five offer.

“It’s a blessing,” said Straughton on being recruited by multiple division-I programs despite only being a freshman in high school. “Around this time last year, I wasn’t thinking that I was going to have this amount of offers. I’m just thankful for my mom and dad pushing me each day and just telling me to keep working.”

Despite growing up in Michigan, he has no allegiances to a Big-10 program out there. In fact, Straughton said West Virginia was a school he wanted to go to growing up after watching Tavon Austin dominate the college circuit on YouTube.

“(West Virginia is) a school I wanted to go to (growing up),” said Straughton. “Because five years ago, watching Tavon Austin on YouTube. You can’t say you don’t want to go there after watching Austin on YouTube…

“I just want to experience the atmosphere there.”