Smelling the roses
Highly recruited Caleb Kelly chose to leave his home state and sign with Oklahoma out of high school. Now, the linebacker is back home playing in the Rose Bowl for the Sooners.
LOS ANGELES — Sitting on an elementary school stage a year and a half ago in Fresno, California, Caleb Kelly announced that he would soon leave his hometown to join the football program in Norman.
He chose Lincoln Elementary purposefully, intent on inspiring kids and Fresno families, to show them that if they worked hard enough, they could follow in his footsteps.
There haven’t always been many of those role models for the kids in Kelly’s hometown to look up to.
Sure, there have been signing day ceremonies in the football-crazed town for other players, including a couple bound for Oklahoma. But many of the players who went to Norman ended up back in Fresno within a few years.
Nearly through his second year with the Sooners, Kelly is proving that he’s breaking the mold.
“He really wanted Fresno to have a good name because he believes in our city and in our people,” Kelly’s mom, Valerie, said.
Earlier this week, Kelly returned home to California — but he brought
body asks me, I always tell them what I’ve been through and what I had to do,” Kelly said. “It’s hard going all the way from California to Oklahoma because I’m a mama’s boy, too, so being away from my family, it’s very hard.
“But having all those guys from Fresno looking up to me is awesome.”
Before Kelly arrived in Norman, the Sooners weren’t having much luck with recent recruits from Fresno. In the span of two years, L.J. Moore, Hatari Byrd and Michiah Quick, all Fresno products, either left or were dismissed from the program.
The Fresno-to-Norman pipeline was losing its luster, and defensive coordinator Mike Stoops knew it would take a special person to reignite it.
When he met Kelly, Stoops knew he’d found the perfect player to do that.
“He was different than some of the other kids,” Stoops said. “Fresno is a tough area. There’s a lot of challenges coming out of Fresno. You’re going to go on one side of the tracks or the other. He always stayed on this side of the tracks and never wavered.
“I think it’s the commitment to his mother to be successful in whatever he does. That’s the thing that I really respect about him.”
Stoops extended an offer to Kelly when he was just 15. That was the linebacker’s first Division I offer, but dozens soon followed.
All the while, Stoops maintained contact with Kelly and his mom, making in-home visits right up until the 2016 signing day.
The Sooners kept their message steady. If Kelly came to Oklahoma, he would inherit a family. With linebacker Eric Striker set to graduate, there would be an opportunity to play right away. And, if Kelly came to OU, he could help restore Fresno’s reputation.
“They said (the Fresno players) haven’t really done anything, and you could possibly do something,” Kelly said. “Just come out here, and be with us and we’ll change it.”
But Stoops wasn’t the
only coach trying to sell Kelly on his program.
Coaches from Oregon, Notre Dame and OU rotated through in-home visits in the final weeks before signing day.
Finally, Valerie had enough. It was time for her son to make a decision.
After eliminating Oregon, Kelly took a piece of notebook paper and ripped it in half. On one piece he wrote Oklahoma. On the other, he wrote Notre Dame.
He folded up the pieces of paper and handed them to his mom. Then he disappeared for a second, and when he returned, he had two baseball hats.
He told his mom to place one piece of paper under one and one under the other while he was out of the room.
Minutes later, Kelly lifted a hat, unfolded the tiny piece of paper.
Relief washed over him when he saw he had chosen Oklahoma.
“When I was reaching
in,” he said, “I knew where I wanted to go.
“We just felt at home, especially with Coach Mike. He was my main recruiter. He was the first person to ever believe in me, gave me my first offer.”
In two seasons with the Sooners, Kelly has become a key component of OU’s defense. A year ago, he recorded a breakout performance in the Sugar Bowl with a career-high 12 tackles.
Now, he’ll be faced with stopping Georgia’s dynamic run game in the Rose Bowl, and he’ll be doing it with his community cheering him on.
“Our community is so much behind Caleb, it’s amazing,” Valerie said. “So many people, whenever I see people everywhere I go, they have something positive to say. He’s really had a good support system here. Not just his family, but his friends, the community, everybody backs him up.”