{"id":400197,"date":"2024-06-05T14:16:10","date_gmt":"2024-06-05T14:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=400197"},"modified":"2024-06-05T15:04:08","modified_gmt":"2024-06-05T15:04:08","slug":"pony-up-to-bama-alabama-football-flips-keelon-russell-from-smu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=400197","title":{"rendered":"Pony up to &#039;Bama? Alabama football flips Keelon Russell from SMU"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Alabama football pulled off a big-time flip on Wednesday, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msn.com\/en-us\/sports\/other\/alabama-football-flips-commitment-from-4-star-qb-keelon-russell-in-class-of-2025\/ar-BB1nD4jM?ocid=BingNewsSerp\">landing quarterback Keelon Russell<\/a>. The four-star had been committed to SMU before committing to the SEC juggernaut.<\/p>\n<p>It is a big-time recruiting win for <a href=\"https:\/\/rolltidewire.usatoday.com\/\">Alabama<\/a> to not just land the consensus four-star recruit but to flip him from his hometown school.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/247sports.com\/Player\/Keelon-Russell-46137983\/\">247Sports<\/a> has Russell as the No. 39 player in the nation in the 2025 class. According to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/college-sports\/football\/recruiting\/player\/_\/id\/254563\/keelon-russell\">ESPN<\/a>, he is the top quarterback recruit in the class.<\/p>\n<p>Baylor, Duke, <a href=\"https:\/\/gatorswire.usatoday.com\/\">Florida<\/a>, Ole Miss, <a href=\"https:\/\/duckswire.usatoday.com\/\">Oregon<\/a>, TCU and Virginia Tech were all offers in what was a crowded recruitment for Russell.<\/p>\n<p>For SMU, losing Russell stings. The starting quarterback at Duncanville High School (Duncanville, Texas), Russell played in SMU&#8217;s backyard. Duncanville finished sixth last season in the <a href=\"https:\/\/usatodayhss.com\/2023\/final-2023-usa-today-sports-super-25-football-rankings-bishop-gorman-adds-4th-national-champ-title\">USA TODAY HSS Super 25<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maxpreps.com\/tx\/duncanville\/duncanville-panthers-and-pantherettes\/athletes\/keelon-russell\/?careerid=20qle0rf4o600\">Russell completed 74.1 percent<\/a> of his passes for 3,267 yards. He had 35 touchdowns and three interceptions.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-media-max-width=\"560\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Nice TD pass from On300 2025 QB Keelon Russell before half via <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Texan_Live?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@Texan_Live<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/XDqjYxQ4S1\">https:\/\/t.co\/XDqjYxQ4S1<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/pGw59IknNC\">pic.twitter.com\/pGw59IknNC<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BillyEmbody?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@BillyEmbody<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Charles Power (@CharlesPower) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CharlesPower\/status\/1695264227982704708?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">August 26, 2023<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>With the commitment of Russell, the Crimson Tide now have nine commitments. They now have the eighth-best recruiting class in the nation in the <a href=\"https:\/\/247sports.com\/Season\/2025-Football\/CompositeTeamRankings\/\">247Sports rankings<\/a>.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"related shortcode shortcode--related\">\n<h2 class=\"related__header\">Related<\/h2>\n<p><a class=\"block block--related\" href=\"https:\/\/usatodayhss.com\/2024\/4-star-cb-dorian-barney-transfers-to-georgia-football-power-carrollton\" data-track=\"usatodayhss-in-article-related-curated\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"block__title\">4-star CB Dorian Barney transfers to Georgia football power Carrollton<\/h2>\n<p><\/a><a class=\"block block--related\" href=\"https:\/\/usatodayhss.com\/2024\/nil-approved-for-florida-prep-athletes\" data-track=\"usatodayhss-in-article-related-curated\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"block__title\">NIL approved for Florida prep athletes<\/h2>\n<p><\/a><a class=\"block block--related\" href=\"https:\/\/usatodayhss.com\/2024\/wheres-the-whistle-texas-high-school-football-is-facing-an-officials-shortage\" data-track=\"usatodayhss-in-article-related-curated\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"block__title\">Where&#039;s the whistle? Texas high school football is facing an officials shortage<\/h2>\n<p><\/a><\/aside>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Keelon Russell is headed to Alabama.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":286601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400197"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=400197"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":400199,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400197\/revisions\/400199"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/286601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=400197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=400197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=400197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}