South Floridians will be everywhere in Miami-Alabama. Many are playing for the Tide

At some point in the Miami Hurricanes’ season opener against the Alabama Crimson Tide on Saturday, Mike Harley will line up in the slot — as he so often does — and run a route across the middle and find himself covered by Jordan Battle.

Fred Battle, the star safety’s father, will certainly be giddy. The two Broward County natives were classmates in elementary school and later teammates at St. Thomas Aquinas in Fort Lauderdale. He even helped coach the two athletes in basketball when they were young.

“It was a bond, like a family bond,” Harley said Tuesday. “I could call his mom, ‘Mom, can I stay tonight, this weekend?’ ... We’ve just been close ever since.”

Alabama’s entire secondary is loaded with South Floridians. Harley is in a group chat “with all the guys from Broward,” including Battle and and backup defensive back Daniel Wright, who played at Boyd Anderson in Lauderdale Lakes. Star cornerback Josh Jobe, who played at Columbus in Miami before finishing finishing high school at Connecticut’s Cheshire Academy, will probably match up against Harley, too.

The top-ranked Crimson Tide has five players from Miami-Dade and Broward counties on its two-deep depth chart. Freshman Ja’Corey Brooks, who won a state championship at Miami’s Booker T. Washington in 2019 before playing his senior season in Bradenton at IMG Academy, is a reserve wide receiver, as is sophomore Thaiu Jones-Bell, who graduated from Carol City in Miami Gardens. Freshman Dallas Turner, a reserve linebacker, also was a teammate of Battle’s with the Raiders.

Star offensive lineman Evan Neal, who’s originally from Okeechobee and played three years at IMG, also has deep family ties to the Hurricanes.

Alabama has separated itself from most of college football largely by dominating in recruiting and turning those topflight recruits into first-round picks. Neal, who was a five-star recruit in the 247Sports.com composite rankings for the Class of 2019, is a likely first-round pick in the 2022 NFL Draft. Battle and Jobe, a pair of former four-star recruits, could go in the first or second rounds. It’s easy to envision Brooks, another former five-star recruit, as a future top-five pick, too.

Miami targeted all four and all four opted to leave the state.

Josh Jobe and Jordan Battle

Jobe got closest to staying home. He pledged to the hometown team in 2015 and spent more than two years committed to the Hurricanes, before flipping to Alabama four days before the early signing period in 2017.

Miami made him a major priority in the days leading up to the signing period, sending several coaches up to Cheshire in December of 2017 to make one final pitch to the defensive back, who left Florida for his senior season because he was too old to play in the Florida High School Athletic Association.

With the Crimson Tide, Jobe has been a contributor since his freshman year.

In Battle’s case, the Hurricanes simply waited too long to make him a priority, even though he came from a family of Miami fans. Battle initially committed to the Ohio State Buckeyes in 2018 and eventually flipped to Alabama a few months later during the early signing period.

Battle started four games as a freshman in 2019.

“In my eyes, he’s a ballhawk. He’s fast from sideline to sideline, he’s physical and he’s really smart,” Harley said. “I was watching a lot of film on him and he knows what he’s doing. He studies his film. He knows what’s coming.”

Ja’Corey Brooks

Brooks is poised to follow a well-trod path for wide receivers: South Florida to Tuscaloosa to the first round of the NFL Draft.

Amari Cooper did it in 2015 — he went from Miami Northwestern to the Dallas Cowboys. Calvin Ridley did it in 2018 — he went from Monarch in Pompano Beach to the Atlanta Falcons. Jerry Jeudy did it in 2020 — he went from Deerfield Beach to the Denver Broncos.

The Hurricanes wanted Brooks badly — almost everyone did — yet he picked Alabama in 2020. Miami was among Brooks’ top suitors, but never seriously threatened the Crimson Tide in his recruitment. He locked in with Alabama before his junior year ended and never wavered.

Evan Neal

No whiff was tougher than Neal. It’s fair to say the massive offensive lineman was the Hurricanes’ top overall target in 2019.

At the time, offensive line was easily Miami’s biggest need and Neal came from a family of Hurricanes fans. He’s even a cousin of former Miami running back Cleveland Gary. Even though Okeechobee isn’t exactly South Florida, Miami is still the closest Power 5 Conference program to Neal’s hometown.

Neal often said Mark Richt was the coach he talked to most frequently, and Miami tried to sell him on familial ties and early playing time. The Hurricanes even offered Edrick Neal, the lineman’s brother, a chance to join the team as a preferred walk-on.

In the end, Neal went to Alabama, where he could virtually guarantee himself a national championship and go through the Crimson Tide’s proven player-development system. Neal, who was 6-foot-7 and 360 pounds in high school, is now a relatively trim 350 and a preseason All-American, and he didn’t even have to wait to play — he started all 13 games at left guard as a freshman in 2019.

Now he’s one of the biggest reasons Miami is a massive underdog Saturday. Neal will frequently match up against defensive lineman Jahfari Harvey, who has made just one career start. It’ll be a throwback to when they were both freshmen — Neal at Okeechobee and Harvey at Vero Beach — and went against each other in a spring game.

The Hurricanes hoped they’d be sharing a locker room. Instead, they’ll battle on one of the sport’s biggest stages and and Alabama will seemingly have the advantage.

“I’ve seen him play a couple times,” Harvey said. “He’s good competition, a big guy.”

This story was originally published September 3, 2021 at 5:09 PM.

David Wilson

Miami Herald

305-376-3406

David Wilson, a Maryland native, is the Miami Herald’s utility man for sports coverage.