Saint Louis QB Tagovailoa picks Alabama
JAMM AQUINO / NOV. 2015
Saint Louis’ Tua Tagovailoa (13) soared into the end zone for a touchdown over Kahuku’s Kekaula Kaniho (1) during the second half of the 2015 HHSAA Division I Football Championship at Aloha Stadium.
Saint Louis School quarterback Tua Tagovailoa ended his recruitment process today, announcing he has committed to Alabama and coach Nick Saban.
The 6-foot-1, 215-pound junior had 19 scholarship offers that he whittled down to a final six of Alabama, Hawaii, Ole Miss, Texas A&M, USC and UCLA before picking the defending national champions.
Alabama has won three of the past five and four of the past seven national titles.
“It was a hard decision, but I chose Alabama because I went there and made so many friends so fast and it was kind of like a connection with the guys who would take me to church with them and take me to bible studies,” Tagovailoa told the Star-Advertiser. “It’s all in my line of how my parents want me to go about doing things.”
Tagovailoa will be the first player from Hawaii to play for Alabama since place-kicker Peter Kim, a Kaiser High graduate, lettered from 1980 to ’82.
Tagovailoa, who plans to graduate in December and enroll at Alabama in January, enters his senior season at Saint Louis with 5,503 passing yards and 57 touchdowns. He will need 2,499 yards to eclipse the state’s career passing record held by another Saint Louis great, Timmy Chang, who went on to play for Hawaii.
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43 responses to “Saint Louis QB Tagovailoa picks Alabama”
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Congratulations and good luck. Good choice.
He Will.be back in two years.
Hahahaha! For some reason I believe this! Unless it’s for his draft party at the St. Louis Clubhouse! Good luck Tua!
You’re just rude. How about wishing this young man good luck.
Why would he return to play for a loser?? Give me a break!!!!
could be a star at UH, chances are a benchwarmer at bama. Good luck!
Hodad, you get one ho in your head.
Alabama players go high in the draft for Rb, recievers, defense and O line. But not for Qb.
Just ask Ken Stabler and Joe Namath
Ken stabler,joe namath???
Ahhh, stabler died of old age and namath is senile. So what alabama qb was drafted in the last 50 years?
Traitor, go to Alabama and warm the bench.
6’1″, isn’t he a little small for a top 3 college QB? How is he going to see over that huge Tide O-line?
Johnny Manziel did a pretty good job at 6’0! Oh well! Best of luck to him!
well, if Saben didn’t think he could play there, he would not have offered him. Nor would Ole Miss, USC or any other of the nations top programs.
if he was scheduled to play college in 2016 you might have a point. he reports to alabama in 2017, and most likely will continue to grow during his senior year.
Really? If you were 17 and given the chance to play for the most storied program in college football history, would you turn it down?
and what, he should stay in Hawaii where no pro scouts even stay up late enough to watch the game?
If you can play, they will find you
Traitor? Anyone with half a brain would do the same. How many championships does UH have?
Traitor? Because he wants to excel at a real university powerhouse and not languish in some weak Mountain West, or whatever they call it these days conference?
Old trick of Saban is to take the best recruits so his opponents don’t have them. During Tua tenure there will be 16 more #1 hs quarterbacks recruited at Alabama. They runs 60% of the time. It’s a rb school as they go high in the draft. Not so much a qb school. Oh well he can still de commit.
A young man from Hawaii commits to the best football program in the nation and you can’t cheer for that? You’re sick!
Hard to turn down. But where’s the news about the Basketball recruits, we still only have 2 bigs with 5 open scholarships?
Good for him. Did they offer jobs to his parents so they can be close to him? Anyway story is done he ain’t committing to UH so enough of that, so yeah let’s talk basketball recruiting.
Ditto to dat, where are the BB bigs???
It’s been nearly one hour since his announcement and Rolltide.com has no news about this! Shows just how much he means to them! Guess I’m just venting a little since I thought he would commit to Hawai’i especially since he wanted to announce his commitment exclusively on a local news channel! Best of luck to you young man! Congratulations to his `Ohana as this will be an amazing ride if he can stay healthy! Roll Tide Roll!
Wish Tua the best, but being 5 thousand miles away from home is tough. Sure they act like your’e the king, but what happens after you sign and attend school. Will it be the same? I think not. Also, that state has alot of racism and rednecks but give it a try and experience life.
Maybe because its after midnight in Alabama and they are asleep. They told him they would not put the information up until is was done the way he wanted it exclusively and they honored that, they didn’t let it leak. Im happy for him. He didnt stay in the comfort zone of the Pac12
I am on the East Coast– go look again– go to google and search in “news” for Tagovailoa– tons of news on this and on what a great recruit Saban was lucky to get. Keep in mind that last year Tua threw with Mariota and Woolsey, while Woolsey outhrew everyone including Tua and Mariota, Tua was impressive with his accuracy and velocity. Essentially, he may not be as good a runner as Mariota, but he is in the opinion of many, a better thrower than Mariota.
Great choice.
The competition in that program will be severe. They do not tolerate inconsistency or lack of significant progress with all that is at stake in a program at that level. Many athletes have probably been disillusioned when they don’t measure up after going there and being surrounded by the same or even greater players. Good luck to him to see if he can succeed like Mariota, but that rarely happens and may be even tougher at Alabama. Let’s hope if he doesn’t shine there and is buried on the depth chart, that he sees the light and returns home where he may stand out and be even be more successful than at Alabama, including going to the NFL someday. At a minimum, the cultural shock aspect will be significant for him.
Not everyone is stuck in their head about culture shock. some look at it as a life experience. Its not much different than going to UCLA or Wisconsin or Arizona. Still going across the pacific
Congrats young man, you got to say Kahuku’s Defense did a good job of shutting him down, also in 2010 Kahuku also did a pretty good job against Marcus .. I’m just Venting ………………
yes and none of the Kahuku guys who shut down Marcus won the Heisman or any other major award did they.
They’re on road crews patching up after a rainstorm
Not a fact, don’t see former Kahuku football players on the road crews and there’s nothing wrong with doing an honest days work patching up the pot holes so that motorist may drive in comfort..thanks road crew.
And that’s also a fact but the fact of the matter is, Kahuku’s Mantri Teo (Laie grown) won many major awards and Kahuku will always be the only high school in Hawaii to claim the most NFL players.
And that’s a fact and as a result…”State Champs!!”
Good luck Tua. Make Hawaii proud
Good luck Tua. If for whatever reason it doesn’t work out at Alabama, you are always welcome to come back home and play for UH. We can sure use you.
Congratulations Tua, be checking in with the Tide this year. As for you negitive people out there, let the young man enjoy his choices and experience life outside of Hawaii, we all know you JEALOUS!!! Like a bunch of crabs in a bucket I tell you… Crabs in a Bucket.
Good luck to Tua and his family. While I would never want to live in Tuscaloosa (I have been there twice) or Montgomery the home of Auburn, there are those who love it there. I ran into some Filipinos and Koreans in Tuscaloosa who were very happy there (the Korean and Filipino diaspora is incredible– they retain some of their culture, but adapt to wherever they live). I know there are Hawaiians in Mobile, Alabama who also love living in Alabama.