Little more than couple weeks ago Brian Dohn put up a post on his "Inside UCLA" blog with the title "waiting for commitments" showing how UCLA had 0 commitments from this year's recruiting class. Although Brian didn't come out and concern troll out right in his post, the way he laid it out the hint of concern trolling (OMG what's wrong here?!! Neuheisel has no commitments!!!!) was fairly clear (predictably it set of a panicked discussion on message boards). We noted it in the background and laughed out loud a bit thinking how silly that post was going to look in the coming weeks. Well it is certainly looking kind of dumb today after Neuheisel and co. pulled off a solid day of recruiting this week.
First of all it looks like Rick Neuheisel and Norm Chow have hauled in another big time high school quarterback. (HT to BruinFanBaby) from the Bay Area. Just hours after getting an offer from UCLA, Brett Nottingham from Monte Vista High School, called CRN to let him know that he was ready to be Bruin. From the Contra Costa Times:
"I talked about it with my parents for a couple hours and talked to some of my uncles and my grandmother before deciding," Nottingham said. "I called Coach Neuheisel to tell him, and he was really excited. He told me he sees a lot of success down the road."
Nottingham was at UCLA for a two-day camp where he threw in front of the UCLA coaches and participated in a white-board session with Neuheisel and offensive coordinator Norm Chow. In a phone conversation after the workout, Neuheisel offered the scholarship to the Mustangs' prized quarterback.
"I was always leaning toward UCLA," he said. "We've had a lot of family go there, and it's such a well-rounded university. When they came around (with the offer) there was no way I could say no."
His oldest sister, Megan, just graduated from UCLA, and his other sister, Ali, will be a senior there in the fall.
As a junior, Nottingham threw for 3,164 yards and 39 touchdowns while leading the East Bay's top-ranked offense.
Nottingham, who carries a 4.0 GPA and plans to major in economics, also seriously considered Colorado and Stanford.
Brett's Dad also went to UCLA Medical School. Brett becomes the first big time Bay Area QB (aplogies to the Law Firm for not considering him as a blue chip QB) to become a Bruin since Drew Olson (whose Dad also BTW went to UCLA for graduate (law) school). I like this pickuop for couple of reasons. First let's look at some of the highlights:
Brett Nottingham Football 2010 (via mvqb4life10)
At 6-4, 210 he certainly looks the part. Furthermore, I think Brett sounds like the perfect recruit who Coach Chow will be able to groom for few years before he is ready to take the reigns from the current rotation of Prince, Brehaut (and maybe Crissman). Brett will have the luxury to come in and red shirt right away and get at least 2-3 years to familiarize himself with Chow's offense. I think by the time he will be competing for the starting job he will be a redshirt sophomore. In terms of building out depth at QB, it couldn't be working out any better for UCLA IMHO. Anyway, a huge welcome to Brett from Bruins Nation.
But wait ... there is more. Brett was not the only recruit to commit to Neuheisel yesterday. He picked up yet another committment - defensive lineman Wesley Flowers - from Fresno's Edison High School to followup the committment of Tevin McDonald. From Tracy Pierson at Bruin Report Online (article not under subscription firewall):
Wesley Flowers, the 6-4, 255-pound defensive lineman from Fresno (Calif.) Edison, verbally committed to UCLA this morning.
Flowers finished his junior season with 50 tackles, 16 tackles for loss, six sacks and two fumbles caused. He says he can bench 305-pounds and squats 350.
He has a good, wide frame, and it's believed he'll grow into a defensive tackle.
Before the UCLA scholarship offer, he had offers from Washington and Fresno State.
And guess who is excited about it: former Trojan/Niner great Edison High's head coach Tim McDonald:
The coach at Edison, Tim McDonald, who is also the father of Tevin, said: "Wesley committed to UCLA today. I am excited about my two Bruins. I had a good conversation with with Coach (Rick) Neuheisel today. They are both firm commits."
Works for us. Go over to BRO and read the whole story which also has a great interview Scout.com did with Flowers during a recent camp in LA. With Flowers and Nottingham's commitments UCLA now has 4 recruits from the class of 2010 and you can bet that the coaches are just getting warmed up.
GO BRUINS.