Boise State and the Mountain West in general are no strangers to schools from bigger conferences attempting to (and sometimes succeeding in) stealing recruits from them, sometimes even after they’ve been committed for months. It’s happened before and it will happen again but this weekend presented the example of this young recruiting season as Cal offered 3 star RB and Boise State commit Kazmeir Allen. His tweet announcing the “dream school” offer had many Bronco fans worrying about the status of his verbal pledge.
Wow! Just received my 1️⃣2️⃣th offer from my dream school.. The University of Cal Berkeley! Thank you to the whole staff and Coach Wilcox pic.twitter.com/jdfz6xH7y7
— Ka meir Allen (@kazmeir_) July 29, 2017
Mountain West Connection reached out to Allen Sunday night to get his thoughts on both the Cal offer and his commitment to Boise State. In what could be a surprise to some, he set the record straight by saying “My thoughts haven't changed about Boise. There still #1 in my recruitment.”
Allen went a bit more in depth, speaking to how much the Cal offer means to him as well as his recruiting plan going forward.
“The Cal offer is just special because I've been telling my parents since I was a little kid that I was going to go to Cal and when they offered me I was just blown away that I have the chance to go do something I've been talking about since a I was a kid. It being in the Bay Area is great. I have a lot of family in Oakland and my parents, friends and family would be able to go to a game easier.”
“That being said, I'm still gonna be open with every school. I'm still gonna text a coach back if they text me. I don't want bad blood with any coach because anything can happen in recruiting, a coach leaves or something. I don’t want to close a door because I've just haven't been answering calls, text etc. So that's the reason why I will still be open to talking with coaches.”
Allen is far from the only kid who still keeps in contact with other coaches after he has committed. In today’s recruiting world, things are constantly changing. Offers come in as late as the night before signing day or a coach tells a player he’s staying only to leave a week later. Coaches tell a player who has been committed for months to start looking elsewhere once they secure a commitment from a higher rated player and players visit other schools after they have verbally committed. This is not a knock on any school, coach or player, these are simply facts and Allen seems to understand them.
“I’m going to take official visits to both schools. Other than that, I have the same mindset and two goals. To get my degree and play in the NFL.”
As stated at the beginning, this is nothing new for Boise State. They fight the annual battle of keeping other teams from poaching their commits. Coach Harsin eluded to this on Signing Day this past year. This battle is simply more visible than some other ones. From Allen’s perspective, he already knew Boise State is a good fit for him and they are still his top school. Now he has time to think and see if his favorite school from when he was a child would also be a good fit for him.