Panthers could be fit for former USC receiver Legette

The Carolina Panthers need explosive players at the wide receiver position. They also hold the No. 33 and No. 39 overall picks in next week’s NFL Draft.

Could it be an ideal landing spot for South Carolina wide receiver Xavier Legette?

Legette, who broke out as a fifth-year senior last season for the Gamecocks, is primarily being projected as a late first round or early second round pick in NFL mock drafts. He said on Thursday that he’s visited with the Panthers “about four times” during the draft process.

Speaking in Greenville, where he was honored as the South Carolina Football Hall of Fame’s college player of the year, Legette was also complimentary of the Panthers as an organization and said his “top 30” visit with them (reserved for a team’s top targets) was a success.

“It’d be good for my family,” Legette, a Mullins, South Carolina native, said ahead of the organization’s induction ceremony at Hotel Hartness. “They’d be close. That’d be the best part about it. Just being able to have them come to the games.”

He added of the Panthers, who enter 2024 with a new coach in Dave Canales and new general manager in Dan Morgan: “I’ve visited with them about four times . ... The top 30 visit went well – I just did it about two weeks ago.”

Legette, 23, joined South Carolina as a three-star recruit in 2019, back when Will Muschamp was the coach. He showed flashes of explosiveness across his first four seasons — whether it was his 2022 kickoff return touchdown against Texas A&M, or his circus catch against Notre Dame in the Gator Bowl — yet he wasn’t on many draft boards entering his fifth year.

But Legette (6-foot-1, 221 pounds) had a breakout senior season, rapidly emerging as the No. 1 target for quarterback Spencer Rattler and putting his name in the Gamecocks record books despite entering the year with just 423 career receiving yards.

In 2023, Legette started all 12 games for USC and led the team in catches (71), receiving yards (1,255) and receiving touchdowns (seven) while seeing his draft stock skyrocket.

He was a bright spot in a