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Saturday, February 5, 2011

Cyrus Kouandjio signs with Alabama

After days of deliberation, Cyrus Kouandjio has picked Alabama over Auburn.

The nation's No. 1 offensive tackle faxed his letter of intent to Alabama on Saturday, ending a brief recruiting struggle between the Iron Bowl rivals in the days following signing day.

"Thanks for all the love and support from the state of Alabama," Kouandjio wrote on his Facebook wall. "love all the new relationships i have made throughout this process. . but at the end of the day. . ima keep the fam together and i must say. . . . ROOLLLLL TTIIIDDDEEE!!!"

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Kouandjio's brother, Arie, recently finished his redshirt freshman season at Alabama. He confirmed the news on his Twitter and Facebook pages as well.

Cyrus, who recently finished his senior season at DeMatha High in Hyattsville, Md., strongly considered the Tigers in the final weeks of the recruiting season. He visited Auburn on the weekend of Jan. 28.

On National Signing Day, he announced on ESPNU that he would sign with Auburn in what was considered a signing day coup for the Tigers. But he had immediate doubts about his decision, which he said he came up with on the spot, and never faxed his letter of intent.

Without Kouandjio, Auburn's 2011 signing class is ranked second by Scout, third by ESPN and seventh by Rivals.

Auburn still landed an offensive line class that recruiting sites rank among the best in the country. It includes the consensus No. 1 center (Reese Dismukes), Scout's No. 1 guard (Christian Westerman) and Rivals' No. 2 guard (Greg Robinson).

14 comments:

postermom said...

Bless his little waffling heart. I hope he can sleep at night now knowing he did what was best for him.

War Eagle AC-47 said...

We signed 24, leaving one slot open for Katmandu. Now that he's off the books, are we still looking to sign somebody?

Anonymous said...

Wonder how much it cost Bama to get him to flip?

Hope him and his brother enjoy going 0-4 against AU during their careers...

elcarg said...

Good luck Cyrus. Hope Auburn fans will wish him well with his decision and let it be. I enjoy knowing that Cyrus and Brent sure seemed to love Auburn and all Bama fans know that.

Anonymous said...

Hope he breaks his leg.

Anonymous said...

He sounded thrilled to sign with that other school, didn't he? "ima keep the fam together and i must say. . . . ROOLLLLL TTIIIDDDEEE!!!" I must say? Sounds like Daddy was standing over him! And this from the Washington Post article: "According to his father, Cyrus Kouandjio was flooded with Facebook messages, friend requests and text messages - which helped sway the decision." Really? Did he really consider the messages on Facebook? Now that's a great way to make a decision!

Oh well. Good luck to ol' Cyrus. I do understand the need to be with brother and all that. That's cool. Pressure from dad just seems a bit over the top.

RW said...

Didn't......want him...anyway. :,(

MikeP said...

Poor kid! He liked the guys he thought were going to be his future team mates at Auburn. He liked the culture at Auburn. He wanted to be an Architect, that's something Auburn offers a degree in and UAT has nothing close. But he signs with bammer to appease his parents. Maybe Saban will drive him up to Bessemer Tech twice a week for a mechanical drawing course and tell him it's architecture?

I do wish, for his sake and ours, that he'd had the gumption to follow his heart, stick to his guns and sign with Auburn.

We've still got the #1 O-line class and a top five class overall, so it's been a great recruiting year.

Bulldogfan said...
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Justin said...

Well, when you think of it, between Cyrus and Calloway, now we won't have to hear any more crap from Bama fans about Cecil making the decision for Cam. All in all I think we've come out better of the family decisions over the past two years.

(Although, of course, Cecil didn't make the decision for Cam the first time around, and it was only after things didn't work out at Florida that it was left up to the family...)

Anonymous said...

good! lets move on now.
poor kid was pulled like taffy.

Shawn B said...

I hate to lose the kid, no doubt, but I never understood how Auburn had much of a chance, considering his brother was already at Bama. I think this speaks volumes of the recruiting offorts from our coaching staff. Well done guys! Well done!!!

Flournoy said...
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Anonymous said...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA..... This is hilarious