First Nebraska football came for Mickey Joseph, the outstanding wide receivers coach at LSU, and soon after the Huskers came for long-time Tigers wide receiver commit Decoldest Crawford.
On Friday morning, the Green Oaks (Shreveport, La.) wide receiver announced he signed with the Huskers and will keep his relationship going with Joseph.
Crawford chose the Huskers over Auburn, Florida or committing back to LSU. The 6-foot-1, 190-pound receiver had been committed since late October, 2019, to the Tigers. But after Brian Kelly was announced as the new coach of LSU and Joseph announced his own return to Lincoln, Crawford was instantly reassessing his options.
Nebraska has one other wide receiver in its 2022 class in Victor Jones Jr., so Crawford adds to a position room that needs immediate production next year as the Huskers seek to replace Samori Toure, who led the team in receiving yards. It brings Nebraska’s 2022 class up to 14 signings, not counting transfer portal additions.
Crawford had a rough 2021. His high school team struggled through a rebuilding season. A change at quarterback made things difficult on offense and slowed Crawford’s production considerably and a broken finger ended his season early. In prior years, however, Crawford was putting up bigger seasons and showed an ability to be tough and physical.
The Crawford signature is actually Nebraska’s second commit from Louisiana in the class, as Hutchinson Community College defender Deshon Singleton is from Greensburg.
Joseph and the Huskers have worked to get a stronger foothold in Louisiana with quite a few offers out. Perhaps the Crawford commitment and signing can be the start of a run for the Huskers.
Crawford is a three-star as rated by 247Sports and 247Sports Composite.
Joseph couldn’t talk about Crawford on Wednesday since the prospect hadn’t publicly announced yet. But Crawford’s signing is a possible early indication of what Joseph adds with his recruiting prowess. There’s is a relationship that has been three-plus years in the building, and the wide receiver told reporters on the scene at his commitment that he knew he would follow Joseph right after he took the Nebraska job.
“When you coach at an SEC school and you’re known as a recruiter, I’m OK with that. People say, ‘Well, you’re known as a recruiter.’ Well, you know what, I’ve never seen a bad coach with good players, and I’ve never seen a good coach with bad players,” Joseph said on Wednesday as he met local media. “So I don’t mind being known as a recruiter, because I know I can coach football.”
Joseph also sees another angle that can be successful as he recruits and pursues players like Crawford at his alma mater like Nebraska.
“I tell them that everybody’s going to have facilities, everybody is going to have big stadiums, locker rooms. I sell the people in the building and I sell the people in the state of Nebraska,” Joseph said. “Because there’s really good people here…
“I think you sell that to kids. But you also sell them, like, ‘Come be a part of something special. The attention that you’re going to get when you’re here.’ Because in this state it’s one team. You don’t have to have LSU, Tulane and then you got the Saints. You got Nebraska. That’s the attention that you’re going to get. And we all know these kids, these days, they need the attention, they want the attention. So they can get all the attention that they want.”