re: Class of 2017 Recruiting MEGATHREAD: Say Your Goodbyes Edition

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Alabama is on the hunt for its seventh straight recruiting championship. Join us here on SEC Country for a daily recap of Alabama recruiting news, insight on what’s happening behind the scenes, and for a glimpse at what’s coming next.

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Alabama commit giving Georgia a look

Nick Saban doesn’t accept many commitments from players three years away from their National Signing Day, but he did take Trey Sanders, the nation’s No. 1 athlete in the Class of 2019. That goes to show you how special of a player he is.

Sanders spoke with our Georgia recruiting reporter Jeff Sentell recently and he told him that he already knows the Bulldogs will get an official visit when his senior year rolls around.

The 6-foot-1, 205-pound prospect visited Athens in June and liked what he saw from the Bulldogs.

“I am still young and going through the recruiting process and just exploring everything out there I can, but I really like Georgia a lot,” Sanders said.

It’s obviously extremely early in his recruitment, but Sanders is a recruit Alabama is going to fight to keep. He’s already been clocked at 4.5 in the 40-yard dash and has the ability to play both running back and safety on the next level.

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LEXINGTON, Ky. — What many Kentucky football fans love about coach Mark Stoops is that from the day he was hired in December of 2012, he made it clear the Wildcats would no longer concede recruiting battles for elite prospects to the traditional powers, especially with in-state stars. That philosophy is a double-edged sword.

It has led to some unprecedented signing-day success – UK swept the state’s top three recruits, each of them U.S. Army All-Americans, in 2016 – but also risks bitter disappointment and untold hours of wasted effort when a juggernaut like Alabama is the competition.

Stoops struck an early blow, beating the Tide for 5-star defensive tackle Matt Elam in 2014, but Nick Saban counterpunched the next year by stealing Damien Harris, the nation’s top running back prospect, from nearby Berea, Ky. Now the tug-of-war is on again with 5-star offensive tackle Jedrick Wills, whose high school is just two miles from Kentucky’s campus.

A college decision is coming soon for Wills, rated the No. 3 tackle and No. 17 overall prospect in the Class of 2017 by Rivals.com, and no one has put in more time pursuing him than the Wildcats.

“They’ve been recruiting me heavy since eighth-grade year,” the now 6-foot-5½, 318-pound Wills told SEC Country before a Lafayette High practice this week. He believes in Stoops and has great relationships with the Cats’ other coaches, easily rattling off four of their names. “They were the first school I talked to, first school I visited. I’ve been with those guys from the beginning.”

But the Crimson Tide, with their four national titles in seven years and yet another No. 1-ranked recruiting class in progress, loom large. Wills’ high school coach, Eric Shaw, raved recently about what a great fit Alabama would be and said this week he expects an announcement before Lafayette’s season opener on Aug. 19.

“Something real simple and sweet – probably just a tweet,” Shaw said. “I think we’re there. His focus is Lafayette football. We lost in the state finals last year and we’re all hungry to get back there. That’s his focus. We don’t need any distractions, and he doesn’t either.”

Florida, Florida State, Georgia, LSU, Michigan, Notre Dame and Ohio State are among Wills’ other suitors. But some good news for UK fans: Wills said recent upgrades – a $126 million stadium renovation and new $45 million training center – put the Wildcats’ facilities on par with the best in college football.

“I went over there to visit for myself and talked to just about every other top recruit, and it’s amazing the things they’ve done,” he said. “The things they have to offer are top-notch … and I’m pretty sure I can speak for all these other recruits, too: when you see that, it’s a wow.”

Still, the latest buzz has been all Bama for Wills. Many recruiting analysts expect him to commit to Saban next week. Even the woman who washes Lafayette’s uniforms, a big Kentucky fan, is beginning to lose hope.

“No comment on that,” Wills said. “I have fans from everywhere still (messaging) me on Twitter, telling each other stories about me coming to Notre Dame, UK, Alabama, Georgia.”

One of his best friends, Lafayette quarterback and Cats commit Walker Wood, claims not to know where Wills is going.

“No idea,” Wood said. “That’s the biggest secret in the world.”

He’s made his pitch for Wills to join him in college, as has former Lafayette lineman Landon Young – the last homegrown 5-star who said no to several premier programs and picked Kentucky. He’s already turning heads a week into his first preseason camp with the Cats.

But Wood and Young try not to lay it on too thick with Wills.

“If it was so repetitive, he probably wouldn’t want to hang out with me anymore,” Wood said. “Everyone in the country is in his ear. I’m not trying to get on his nerves.”

Who would? Wills is a mountain of a young man, already bench-pressing well more than 300 pounds and squatting about 450. Everyone at Lafayette seems to have a Paul Bunyan-esque story to tell about him.

“I saw him pick up a kid and slam him, then stand over him. He was in the seventh grade,” Shaw remembers. “The Lord has blessed him with size, speed and strength, but to have that attitude with it, that’s how I knew he was special.”

Last fall, Wood had to rewind the game film from a recent victory to be sure his eyes weren’t deceiving him. There was Wills, blocking his man with just one hand, shuffling his feet from side to side as he swatted the defender like a fly.

“Toying with the guy,” Wood said. “One of the craziest things I’ve ever seen.”

The question now is whether Wills has been similarly toying with Kentucky, letting the Wildcats come after him with all their energy, only to dismiss them with the flick of a fingertip on a smartphone next week. Shaw offered a glimmer of hope, saying the most important part of this decision is relationships and …

“It’s hard not to have a relationship with an SEC school in your back yard. You can see (UK’s) stadium from the top of mine,” he said. “They’ve done a great job, since Stoops took over, to come in and build those relationships. And I respect that, because that means that they care. And I want my kids, no matter where they go, to go to programs that care about them.”

Maybe that’s just a little last-minute misdirection, but Wood isn’t giving up. Stoops has made it clear he won’t either.

“I got hope,” Wood said. “If he committed to anywhere in the country tomorrow, I’d still have hope. I’m going to be with him until the end of the process. Until he signs those papers, I’m still going to recruit him, and I think UK will do the same.”

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It appears the Hamsah Nasirildeen ship has sailed. Almost all of our CBs for him have been flipped to USCe.

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