Keelon Russell's Commitment to Alabama has the Tide on Top Receiving Targets Radar

When building out a recruiting class the earlier you can land a quarterback the better because the right quarterback attracts a ton of offensive talent to your school. The Alabama Football team landed its quarterback last week when Keelon Russell committed to Alabama. Landing Russell is about to start paying dividends for the Crimson Tide as some of the Nation's top receiving targets head to Tuscaloosa.

This weekend the Tide will only host one wide receiver in Four-Star Travis Smith as the Tide look to make up ground on Georgia.

Where Keelon Russell is showing the Tide a lot to be excited about is with Five-Star recruit Kaliq Lockett. Ranked as the Nation's 18th-ranked player and the third-ranked receiver in the class, Lockett was focusing on Texas, LSU, Texas A&M, and Florida State. With Russell on board, Lockett will make an official visit to Tuscaloosa on June 17th, as the Tide looks to emerge late in his recruitment.

Making a strong impression on Kaliq Lockett will go much further for the Tide than it appears on the surface. Kaliq Lockett has talked with former LSU commit Dakorien Moore and former Alabama commit Jaime Ffrench about teaming up. Moore and Ffrench are five-stars according to On3's Industry Power Rankings, with Moore ranked as the nation's top receiver and Ffrench ranked as the fourth-best receiver.

The Tide has done an excellent job recruiting, but one area the class is weak is receiving threats. The class currently holds just one commitment from four-star receiver Lotzeir Brooks after Ryan Williams reclassified and Jaime Ffrench decommitted. Alabama is in a good place with four-star tight end Nick Townsend who visited this past weekend, and was excited about Russell's commitment:

Friday, June 21st could be Alabama Football's most important recruiting weekend of the year, especially with the receiving talent heading to Tuscaloosa. The Tide will host five-star Caleb Cunningham and four-star Derek Meadows. The Tide will need to make up some ground as Meadows appears headed to Notre Dame while Cunningham could be headed to Auburn or one of the in-state Mississippi schools. The Tide on this set of visits now have the quarterback commit that they can use to sway recruits to Tuscaloosa.

Tuscaloosa Summer Visits have impressed thus far

The takeaway from the first two weekends has been that the new staff is really impressing the players they've gotten on campus. Two weeks in the Tide have landed commitments from Keelon Russell, Chuck McDonald, and Michael Carroll, and have become the expected front runners for Dawson Merrit and Mal Waldrep. These next few weekends Kalen DeBoer and JaMarcus Shepard need to do an incredible job recruiting these wide receivers as Alabama looks to build out its recruiting class.