(01-29-2010 09:25 AM)klake87 Wrote:  

(01-29-2010 09:15 AM)NIU1981 Wrote:  Akron just had a three star running back commit, which leads me to believe Giorgio Bowers will stay with us:

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/re...ward-88164

He has some impressive offers. Good pick up for them.

This is Erick Howard. He's a two-time Mr. Football in the state of Ohio and is a tremendous athlete. He would be going to OSU if he had the grades. He committed to Akron earlier this month, though it is just becoming public in the last day or two. On January 15th he visited Toledo and then started 2nd guessing his commitment to Akron. However, last night Toledo dropped out of the Howard sweepstakes. Howard needs a B average in the spring in order to get eligible and cleared by the NCAA clearinghouse. That's a very tall order for him. He will most likely have to either go prep school route or go to a school with open enrollment and pay his own way for a full year. If he is eligible at that point then he can go on scholarship. Toledo and Akron are the only Ohio schools that have open enrollment and play Division I FBS football, which is why he was looking at them both.

He did setup an official visit to Kent State for this weekend a while back, and Kent State fans say he is visiting this weekend, so it might come down to Akron and Kent State now, but Kent doesn't have open enrollment so that kind of seems pointless to me. I personally don't think he will be eligible.

Anyway, his commitment would not affect Bowers because Howard is more of a future investment, and risky at that. That said, my gut tells me that Bowers is gonna stick with NIU.