A second-year Florida Gators assistant whose position groups shined in the 2012 Gator Bowl in January, linebackers/special teams coach D.J. Durkin was named Rivals.com’s Recruiter of the Year on Monday.

Assigned to the state of North Carolina, Durkin landed four of the area’s top 13 players including five-stars offensive tackle D.J. Humphries and defensive end Jonathan Bullard. He was also the lead recruiter for seven of Florida’s 23 total commitments.

“I am very, very fortunate to be recruiting at a place like Florida because I think the place almost sells itself,” Durkin told Rivals. “It is a great academic institution and there is obviously great football tradition here. We play in a great football stadium in the best conference in the world. I think the place really sells itself.

“When you have a head coach like Coach [Will] Muschamp, who does a great job with the players and has a great knowledge of the game and really recruits as hard as anyone, it makes my job kind of easy.”

Durkin is the second Gators coach in three years to earn Recruiter of the Year honors. Former Florida offensive coordinator (now Temple head coach) Steve Addazio won the award from ESPN in 2010.

Rivals also named Gators tight ends coach Derek Lewis one of the top 25 recruiters in the nation for the 2012 cycle. Lewis reeled in arguably the country’s top two tight ends in four-stars Kent Taylor and Colin Thompson.