Maryland Football Recruiting: Catching Up With Jalen Tabor
The biggest name at the Next Level Nation 5-Star Elite Showcase was without a doubt Friendship Collegiate Academy DB Jalen Tabor. I had the opportunity to have a quick word with Tabor during the event so that he could catch me up on where things stand in the recruiting process.
“Its been real relaxed but real hectic at the same time,” said Tabor when asked how process has been up until this point. “I haven’t been going to a lot of schools but they’ve been contacting me and I’ve been contacting them. So it’s been hectic in that sense, but we’ve been working out and its been real laid back.”
With highly touted recruits like Tabor the recruiting process can be extremely intense as the top programs in the country work their hardest to secure his signature on a National Letter of Intent, however, for the top prospect in the District of Columbia things have been closer to the status quo. “Nothing has changed,” said Tabor. “(It’s) been the same since the end of the season.”
On why he feels it is important to make a Signing Day decision:
One thing that we have seen out of some of the more highly touted prospects to come out of Friendship Collegiate Academy as of late, such as Eddie Goldwater and Terps signee Yannick Ngakoue, would be waiting until National Signing Day to make their announcement public. Not surprisingly, Tabor will take the same approach. “I want to see all the schools and what they have to offer,” said Tabor when asked why he felt it was important to wait until NSD to make his commitment.
The last thing I asked the five-star DB was what schools were sticking out to him at the moment in his recruitment. “Alabama, Florida and Florida State,” were the first schools Tabor ran off. However, Tabor did add “Maryland is still right there,” without any sort of prompting. Recruiting extraordinaire Mike Locksley is the Terrapins recruiter of record for Tabor who turned some heads by showing up to the showcase wearing Florida Gator shorts, socks and rocking a Gators backpack.
While Tabor did not participate in any of the position drills during the showcase the top ranked prospect in Washington D.C. did take part in the “five up”drill yesterday with his teammates in the Friendship Collegiate secondary D’Andre Payne and Dimitri Lee. Below is video of their performance in their first run through of the”five up” drill. Tabor is lined up on the far side in the white t-shirt while showcase MVP D’Andre Payne is lined up as the DB on the near side of the video.