It’s not easy to hold a recruiting class together after the head coach is fired. The blood is in the water for rival recruiters and they move in quickly. And the great unknown about the next staff leads some commitments to look for a more stable situation. Thus far for USC, no 2021 commitment has gone public with a decommitment. But many of them are being bombarded by calls from other schools, and some of them will take the time to listen.
DE TJ Sanders (6-4 285) of Marion committed to the Gamecocks on July 4th and up until Sunday, going somewhere else never crossed his mind. But with the firing of Will Muschamp, and his cell phone blowing up with calls from other programs, Sanders said that’s no longer the case with him.
“Right now I’m still locked in with them,” Sanders said. “A lot of other people have started to talk to me these last couple of days. I talked to Indiana most recently on the phone and a bunch of other schools that started following me on Twitter. I talked to NC State, West Virginia, Vanderbilt and Virginia Tech. Those are just some of the schools that have reached out to me the past couple of days. They’re just talking to me and asking that if anything changes to let them know.”
The USC staff has, of course, been working to keep the commitments in place. Sanders has heard from them.
“I’ve been talking to coach Mike Bobo,” Sanders said. “We’ve just been talking, trying to stay on the same page, making sure we are on the same page basically, that I’m still committed to them. They are still making me a priority. They are telling me to stay patient and see how things play out.”
Just like the Gamecock fans, Sanders is anxious to know who the new head coach will be. He’s heard some of the names being talked about and hasn’t picked a favorite. He’ll just wait and see who is hired and then go from there.
“I’ll look into whoever they choose and see if he is a coach I want to play for,” Sanders said. “I’m following (the search) on social media. I haven’t really thought about going anywhere else yet. I’m just going to see how these next couple of weeks, or month, play out and see where things go from there.”
Sanders, who had 54 tackles last season, estimated he has over 40 tackles this season with 9 sacks.
