Keelon Russell has flipped his commitment from SMU to Alabama, and he plans to lock all the way in with the Crimson Tide.
Russell is one of the nation’s top 2024 quarterback prospects. His commitment gives the Crimson Tide 11 2025 commits, and their only quarterback pledge.
Alabama hosted the four-star for an official visit over the weekend and was able to get him to buy in. His decision came down to a variety of factors, per his dad Brian Russell.
“When you look at the recent history, Mac Jones, Bryce Young, Tua, and his goal has been to be a Heisman-winning quarterback, and there have been so many great quarterbacks at Alabama,” Russell told Touchdown Alabama. “Another thing is the quarterback room is very small, meaning that Jalen Milroe will possibly go to the NFL and even if he doesn’t go to the NFL, there is no one else in the quarterback room that has much snap experience. So when he goes in December to Alabama, he’ll be on an even playing field. Going into the season as a freshman, there’s a possibility that he could possibly be the number two quarterback, fighting for a starting position. Those are all great things. That helped us with somewhat picking Alabama. Another thing was just the college is almost run like an NFL organization. While we were there on the trip, there were several NFL players and current players that came to motivate the people because a lot of people think Alabama’s going to fall off since Saban isn’t there. But you could feel the energy of the players that are currently there that had interest in Keelon. It was an easy decision for him because everybody was like ‘you are QB1,’ and he felt very wanted.”
The Tide’s academic resources also stood out to Russell and his family.
“This was the first official visit where they had academic advisors,” Russell said. “Keelon wants to major in real estate and interior design. There was a professor there telling us how he was going to be able to graduate in three years and be able to get a Master’s in four. So, them already having academic advisors there to help him with his life after football left a major impression on us. They also have a major mentality for NFL preparation. They’re going to prepare him to be on time, they are going to prepare him to have a strong mindset. They are going to prepare him for the NFL mindset. So those are some of the things that we took away even after football.”
Russell gives Alabama’s 2025 quarterback, which should help them continue to build their 2025 recruiting class, especially on the offensive side of the football.
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Justin Smith is the Director of Recruiting for Touchdown Alabama Magazine. You can follow him on Twitter, via @Jdsmith31Smith
