MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - Football coaches can sometimes spend a couple of years establishing relationships with recruits, getting to know them, their coaches, mentors and families.
So when junior college All-American running back Justin Crawford popped up on West Virginia’s radar screen in mid-January after Wendell Smallwood surprisingly declared for the NFL draft this spring, the Mountaineers were swimming upstream to get involved with the 6-foot-1-inch, 200-pound Crawford.
Players as good as Crawford are rarely still available just a few weeks away from signing day.
“I don’t know why his recruiting was slow taking off,” said West Virginia assistant coach JaJuan Seider, the Mountaineers’ lead recruiter for Crawford.