Over the six months since Kalen DeBoer landed the biggest job in college football, Alabama's first-year coach has taken a common theme within him onto the recruiting trail, a message aimed at weaving together the Crimson Tide's storied past and its transformational present.
Markus Cook heard the pitch when DeBoer and his staff began recruiting 2025 offensive tackle commit Micah DeBose, the No. 72 player in the ESPN 300, out of Vigor High School in Prichard, Alabama.
"One of the things DeBoer says to recruits and to families is, 'I don't want to change a culture of things that worked,'" Cook, who began coaching DeBose as an eighth-grader, said.