Top 2028 Mass. ATH Owen DeSalvo Talks Recent UMass Visit

2028 Massachusetts DB/RB Owen DeSalvo recaps his trip to Amherst for the Minutemen's Junior Day.

Owen DeSalvo made his first trip to UMass’ campus for Junior Day last weekend and the 2028 Massachusetts athlete was not disappointed.

“It was great,” DeSalvo told Minuteman Command. “I had a blast.

“We toured the campus. Coach H had a big presentation and we went and toured the campus. Then, we got to tour the whole facility. We got to go through the gym, went to the trainer's facility, had some lunch. It was a good time. I liked it a lot.”

The Buckingham Browne & Nichols star was impressed with the tour of the facilities.

“I thought it was awesome,” he said. “It was really cool, really well built. Yeah, I thought it was great.”

DeSalvo also enjoyed Joe Harasymiak’s presentation about the principles and foundations the head coach plans on building his program upon.

“How he's trying to flip the program around and how he doesn't want us to think anything about the old UMass, how everything's going to be the new UMass,” DeSalvo continued. “I thought that was pretty cool.”

DeSalvo picked up an offer from UMass in January to go with an offer he got from Rhode Island a week earlier. He’s also receiving serious interest from Syracuse.

The 5-foot-11, 185-pounder could play multiple spots in college and the Minutemen see that.

“They were talking about both running back and DB,” he said. “When we had positional meetings, I went with DBs, but I met with (running backs coach Jeremy) Larkin too. I got to get a feel for both, so it was good.”

It’s too early for DeSalvo to have a strong personal preference.

“For now, it's tough,” he said. “I haven't really gotten that much time on offense, full varsity reps on offense yet, so it's kind of hard to tell. Right now, I'd probably say defense just because I have more experience, but I think next year I'll have a better answer because I'll be having more time on offense too.”

DeSalvo enjoyed the time he spent with the UMass coaches.

“I loved them a lot,” he said. “I think they were great. They had great presentations and they seemed very interested in me, so it was good to build a relationship with them in that aspect.”

The Minutemen have made it clear to DeSalvo that he is a major priority for them despite being a prospect in the Class of 2028..

“I think it's pretty cool, but personally for me, I've just got to keep working,” he said. “Obviously I'm only a freshman, so I think my main priority right now is just to keep getting bigger, faster, stronger.”

He doesn’t have any other visits set at the moment, although he’s planning to be at a 7-on-7 tournament at Syracuse in the coming months.

He also expects to return to Amherst this spring.

“I was talking to Coach H about it in his office. I think I just need to keep coming down to campus. I got invited to some of the spring practices, so going down for those and then in the fall coming down to some games just to get more of a feel of the campus and the facilities and everything in that aspect. So just keep building a relationship.”