The Past Leads to the NFL's Future

With the NFL draft just over 24 hours away it seems a perfect time to look back on some of the Sooners top Sunday targets, not so much to throw in with the never-ending over-analysis of their draft stock and hopes but to look back. Below we'll look into each of Oklahoma's leading draft eligible players and the recruiting process that brought them to Norman.

Earlier this spring we re-ranked the seniors, as we do every year, but here we look into what the storylines of their recruiting were.

Alexander, the younger brother of a well known in-state recruit, Derrick Alexander, was well known from early on in his playing career but went a bit under the radar from college recruiters until well into his junior season.

Hailing from one of the state's most talent-rich programs, wasn't a player that Oklahoma made an early push for however when a few things didn't fall their way they didn't waste any time in seizing upon a then Arkansas commitment in mid-October. Alexander's pledge to the Razorbacks was immediately thrown into question.

Just a few weeks later, Nov. 5 to be exact, Alexander had decided to change his decision and head to Norman.

All seemed well before Alexander took an official visit to Arkansas just weeks before National Signing Day. However, he announced that he would be sticking with the Sooners and obviously went on to become a three-year starter for the Sooners.

Bond was a player that quickly became known to Oklahoma fans by being very open about his interest in following his former teammate and Sooner recruiting legend Courtney Gardner.

However, while Gardner's hiccups proved to be insurmountable Bond, originally a 2013 recruit, had many hills to climb, each of which he handled, before he could arrive in Norman one recruiting class after he was initially expected.

Bond wasn't offered by the Sooners in the class of 2013, largely due to his skills being best set to a 3-4, something Oklahoma didn't run at the time. In that time he would actually sign with Miami and seemed all set for Coral Gables. However, he fell, in his words, 'one class short' of enrolling at Miami and was then back on the market.

In the interim the Sooners had switched to a 3-4 and suddenly Bond was a near perfect for a defense transitioning it's linebacker personnel so when news got out of Bond's issues at Miami Tim Kish and co. wasted no time reentering the race.

Bond visited both Oklahoma and Nebraska but chose the Sooners in November of 2013.

Hailing from one of Texas' premier programs, that has produced several strange recruiting stories for the Sooners, it should be no surprise that Kasitati was another.

The high school tight end was seen as a future offensive lineman and made an early commitment to Baylor due, in no small part, to his friendship with fellow Trinity product and Baylor commitment Suleiman Masumbuko. However the Sooners got Kasitati to come in for an official visit, after some very early interest and not a lot in between, on the final weekend before National Signing Day.

From leaving campus Sunday to deciding on Wednesday almost no one knew what Kasitati was thinking and where things might go. But after scheduling a 10 a.m. announcement at Trinity high school during a historic wave of winter weather in Texas his announcement was delayed several times on the morning of National Signing Day.

Some even thought the Sooners could be set to have their first post-NSD recruiting adventure. However it was for not as Kasitati, who most believed personally wanted to head to Baylor, acquiesced to what was believed to be his parent's preference, Oklahoma.

Stories could be, and have been, written about Shepard's years before coming onto Oklahoma's radar but the focus of this piece will continue to be strictly on Shepard's life as a recruit. He began picking up offers early in his junior season but was a bit unclear where things stood with the Sooners.

In early February of his junior year he gained clarity when he was offered by the Sooner staff, roughly three weeks later he accepted the offer and pulled the trigger for the Sooners.

Early in his career he played something of a second fiddle to teammate, and fellow son of a famous father, Barry Sanders Jr. However as a junior that began to fade away as he was a huge part in leading Heritage Hall to a state title in 2010. As a senior, that role completely faded as he was the leading man for the Chargers as they came up short with an upset to Cascia Hall in the state semi-finals.

Tapper first got his name out at the Army All-American combine during January 2010, his junior year, and that initial introduction was all about a defensive end with a great frame and little football background.

Tapper caught the eye of Bobby Jack Wright during the spring evaluation period and seemed to take a shine to the Sooners from the word go. He committed to the Sooners in July thanks to that relationship with Wright.

Though West Virginia, and a few other local programs, tried to push Oklahoma it was a largely straight forward recruitment.

Sanchez showed up to the same Army combine that Tapper made his name at in a big Oklahoma hoodie and admitted to growing up a Sooner fan. However over a year later he was getting no attention from Oklahoma and had committed to Baylor in late July 2011.

Almost immediately upon the departure of Brent Venables and the coinciding arrival of Mike Stoops Sanchez got a visit from the Sooners new defensive coordinator and began giving Oklahoma a serious look. The Sooners interest in him was, in some part, due to the wavering of then commitment, and eventual Oklahoma State standout, Kevin Peterson, an in-state product from Wagoner.

The following weekend after Stoops' visit to Keller Central Sanchez visited Baylor but the Bears weren't able to close the door for the talented cornerback. He visited Oklahoma a week later and after returning home on Sunday night announced his decision to flip to the Sooners.

No player on this list put in more of his own effort to attract Oklahoma's attention than Striker. Striker was hoping for Oklahoma's attention and, well, let's let Striker tell the story in his own words from 2011.

"I always wanted to play at Oklahoma and some people told me that they don't really recruit the Florida area. I was going on their website to try and e-mail them, but they don't have a coach e-mail or a phone number but on their school site they have info for coach Jerry Schmidt," Striker explained."Nothing really came form that so I ended up calling them, and got voicemail, and didn't hear back but I still really wanted to go there and I emailed the football office.

"Still though, I didn't hear anything but (Armwood head) coach Sean 'Cal' Callahan knew them, and said Eric you know what I'll call them and he called coach (Brent) Venables and coach Venables called me and checked me out on Youtube, so then he called coach Cal, and said they talked for about 20 minutes.

"When we finally talked coach Venables was saying he likes the way I play. We talked and said, really we want to see your body type, I want to see you up close this Spring. Then some more time went by and just yesterday after my baseball game I checked my e-mail and I got home at like 10 o'clock and coach Venables said to call him. I didn't want to call him, and the first e-mail said it was a scholarship offer so I couldn't wait.

"Then we talked for about 25 minutes last night and you know what, from your film I want you and we're going to offer you, we talked and I got the offer then."

Striker may have already received his offer but didn't want to disappoint the staff and showed up in Norman for Oklahoma's annual summer camp where he worked out at a variety of positions, notably safety. During that visit he committed to Oklahoma and never seemed to waver from his decision.