Sam Adams II, a 4-star 2020 running back with more than 40 scholarship offers already, decided he needed to streamline his recruitment and narrow down the number of schools to focus on and the number of coaches with whom to keep communicating.

That resulted in the top-15 list he put out Sunday evening, with USC included in the mix.

It was simply time, Adams said.

"Just because with talking to 41 different schools and all those coaches it was stressful," he said. '[The schools not on the list can] focus on other running backs and other players. It just makes it easier on their part and on my part."

Adams, who stars for Eastside Catholic School in Sammamish, Wash., thoroughly scrutinized all his options with a clear strategy in mind in whittling down that list.

"I went through all my schools one by one and just started checking off little things that I didn't like so when I really come down to making the decision the school is everything I wanted," he explained. "Things like problems with the coaching staff, location, stuff like that. … I just started really getting picky."

What remains is a collection of many of the top programs nationwide with Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Texas A&M and South Carolina out of the SEC; Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State from the Big Ten; Texas and Oklahoma from the Big 12; and USC, Washington, Oregon, Cal and UCLA out of the Pac-12.