Vanderbilt pulled a massive upset off the field on Tuesday.
The Commodores convinced five-star quarterback recruit Jared Curtis to flip his commitment from Georgia to Vandy, bringing in a successor to take over at QB after star Diego Pavia departs the program.
Curtis confirmed the news in a statement posted to social media on Tuesday night after several reports surfaced earlier in the day about his decision to change his commitment.
“Being here in Nashville and seeing what Vandy has been doing this season has been amazing and over the past few weeks, I felt more and more that I wanna be a part of that, to be close to home, to play in front of my family and friends and to be what I love to be, an underdog. I am excited to be a Dore and excited to be part of building something here at home with Coach [Clark] Lea,” Curtis wrote.
Curtis is a Nashville native and has been high atop prospect rankings from Rivals and 24/7 Sports while starring at Nashville Christian.
During his junior year, he threw for more than 2,800 yards, had 40 touchdown passes and just three interceptions, while rushing for a score 18 times.
Curtis had originally picked Georgia over Big Ten program Oregon and had a bevy of big-time programs knocking on his door.
In his statement, the teen lamented the fact that word had gotten out about his decision to flip his commitment before he had a chance to speak with the coaches from Georgia and Vanderbilt or have one more chance to talk it all over with his family.
“I actually hadn’t told anyone my final decision, not even my parents or agent,” he wrote. “I wanted to talk to the coaches from both staffs after school and practice were over, and have one last heart-to-heart with my family before making an announcement. Never had a chance and that was really disappointing.”
While Curtis spoke highly of the No. 4-ranked Georgia football program, it seemed as though his change of heart was a hard one because he didn’t want to let anyone down.
“The past year [Georgia is] where I wanted to be and definitely where my parents have wanted me to go,” he explained. “That’s part of what makes this so hard. You try to make everyone who has been good to you and done so much for you happy, and when you can’t it sucks. But I gotta walk my path that feels right in my heart, at the end of the day this has to be my decision.”
Curtis becomes one of the biggest recruiting coups for Vanderbilt in program history and is set to join a program coming off a 10-win regular season under coach Clark Lea that had the Commodores on the cusp of the College Football Playoff.
They were No. 14 in the rankings released on Tuesday.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
