Kalen DeBoer on Alabama’s hot start recruiting: ‘We want people to see the tradition will continue’

Recruiting is a fundamental aspect of leading any college football program, and especially for an Alabama team that long dominated the top of the recruiting charts under Nick Saban. Now, new Crimson Tide head coach Kalen DeBoer is trying to maintain that standard.

DeBoer sat down with Andy Staples for Monday’s live show on the On3 YouTube channel, where the two discussed all the ins and outs of taking on a job as prestigious as Alabama, especially when following the legend who just left the program. Particularly, though, Staples was fascinated in how DeBoer was able to get a jump-start on recruiting within a month of signing on.

Alabama hosted over 100 recruits for an even within the first few months of DeBoer’s tenure and Staples noted that they’ve even landed a top prospect already in Ryan Williams, a five-star wide receiver who is ranked as the No. 5 overall player in the country for 2024, according to On3’s Rankings.

With such impressive early progress on the trail, Staples asked DeBoer if people had been wrong to count out the Tide building a monster class in a transition year for the program.

“Yeah, I don’t think it’s about proving anyone or any group of people wrong or right. I think it’s just really, you know, that’s the lifeblood of what needs to happen for you to be success is the recruiting needs to be on point,” DeBoer explained.

Beyond just landing players and getting the sales pitch right, Kalen DeBoer believes he has a terrific recruiting staff in place who are hungry to land some talent.

“I mean, what you’re talking about is a huge tribute to the staff. I knew that surrounding myself with go-getters, people who were great recruiters, understood what it took, and then also some that had some familiarity with the region, with the conference, our university, and I feel like we’ve really nailed it on the head with who we’ve brought in, whether it’s the recruiting staff, the coaching staff, other support staff. And they’ve just been awesome. They’ve done a great job.”

The early wins are nice, but at this point, DeBoer’s main focus is still getting the roots planted in the recruiting circles.

“Like you said, we’re getting the message out there, we’re getting people to campus, we want them to feel what this place is all about and continue to see that the tradition will continue.”