Ayodele Adeoye commits to Texas, and Mizzou’s margin for in-state recruiting error shrinks further

I joked on Sunday that Mizzou basketball recruiting couldn’t let Mizzou football recruiting have a happy news cycle to itself, butting in with a new commit. On Sunday evening, Mizzou football recruiting also butted in with some bad news to trump the good news.

Ayodele Adeoye, the Ritenour linebacker who went from darkhorse to four-star in the blink of an eye, announced midday that he had a big announcement coming later in the evening. If he was committing at this stage, most presumed, it definitely wasn’t going to be to Mizzou.

It wasn’t.

Now, Adeoye was another member of the Tiger 10 in the “less likely” category from the start. He showed early on, with interest in LSU, Texas, and others, that the effects of his Mizzou unofficial visit in February were not that lasting. Mizzou’s primary hope with him was that a positive fall would sway others, which would lead to him taking another long, hard look at the home-state school.

Technically, that could still happen. But the odds are long.

So that’s three of 10 in-state offers committing elsewhere — Cameron Brown and Mario Goodrich to Nebraska, Adeoye to Texas — with a fourth (Daniel Carson) eliminating Mizzou from his list. Brown remains the only surprise of the bunch (of this group, he was the only one we classified as a “Mizzou lean” back in March), but to hit the “Land half of ‘em” benchmark that many have defined as rock solid success, Mizzou now has to go 5-for-6 with the remainders or hope to get back involved with someone like Brown or Adeoye later on.

That’s going to be tricky, to say the least. Granted, Mizzou appears in decent shape with most of the remaining six, but there’s obviously minimal margin for error.

But, as I write every time there’s bad news from this group, winning games this fall will cure a lot of what is ailing Mizzou at the moment. I don’t know how much — maybe not enough — but I definitely recommend the Tigers try that, just in case.

Happier Links:

• New commit Tyrone Collins didn’t expect to commit to Mizzou while on his unofficial visit, but he fell in love with the coaching staff to such a degree that it just sort of happened. He tore his ACL in February, which almost works in Missouri’s favor — it’s less likely there’s a major rush of blue-bloods recruiting him late — but assuming he gets his speed back (and there’s no reason to think he won’t), the KC Star’s scouting report notes that he is a fearless, willing, exciting defender.
• The Mizzou staff has been extremely high on Jalen Knox for a while and was excited about landing the Arlington, Tex., product. Looks like they will try to land two more receivers in this class. Obviously four-star St. Louisan Kamryn Babb has a spot if he wants one, but another name to watch is 6’2 Manvel (Tex.) receiver Kam Scott, who has offers from Baylor, Louisville, South Carolina, and lots of others but is developing a strong relationship with Andy Hill.

More Links:

• It’s preseason magazine time! The Trib’s Blake Toppmeyer takes a look at what the mags are saying about Mizzou, and, um, I have a recommendation for you.

• Dave Matter wrote a piece on distance runner Karissa Schweizer, maybe Mizzou’s best female athlete on campus at the moment (sorry, Sophie Cunningham). He wrote a companion piece on Schweizer’s distance-running companion, Jamie Kempfer, as well.
• Look at Brian Smith out here, doing some reporting. Mizzou’s head wrestling coach shared an update from University Nationals.

• A while back, I mentioned wondering about the demographics of Missouri’s enrollment fade. Was there one group more likely to stop applying than another? The Missourian began looking into this with this interesting piece. The gist: there are fewer people in the midwest applying to colleges at all, which is a bad place to start, and applications from every group have declined to a certain degree. Also, this:

At MU, that enrollment decline between the 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 school years was felt by a large swath of the state. A steep percentage decline in first-time students, between 50 to 100 percent, occurred in 23 Missouri counties, from urban St. Louis City to rural Mississippi and New Madrid counties, according to MU data.

Declines were also sharp among minority students and those receiving scholarships, the data show. The number of first-time African-American students decreased by 42 percent; overall, the number of first-time minority students dropped by nearly a third. And though there is no way to know the income level of students and their families, while the number of Pell Grant recipients remained steady in 2016, the number of students on the Chancellor’s, Bright Flight and other academic scholarships decreased in 2016. Bright Flight and other state-funded scholarships are expected to decrease again this coming school year.

MU has maintained that the steep decline in first-time students in the fall of 2016 was a fluke. However, a look at overall undergraduate enrollment shows declines across the state as well. While some counties held steady or added students, fewer and fewer students attended MU from most of the state's counties. The declines were heaviest in rural areas.

So yeah, a little bit of everything, I guess.