COLLEGE SPOTLIGHT
Jaire Alexander
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Photo & Story by Jeff Nunn of CardinalSportsZone.com
The University of Louisville had a player
voted to the first team in the first-ever Associated
Press preseason football All-American list.
No it wasn’t the reigning Heisman trophy winner,
Lamar Jackson, but rather junior cornerback,
Jaire Alexander.
Alexander also was named to Sports Illustrated’s
2017 Preseason All-America Team as well as
247Sports’ Preseason All-American team and
the All-ACC preseason team, and was named to
numerous preseason watch lists, including the
Paul Hornung watch list (most versatile player
in major college football), the Jim Thorpe watch
list (best defensive back in college football), the
18 EXTOL SPORTS / OCTOBER 2017
Bednarik watch list (college defensive player of the
year) and the Nagurski watch list (best collegiate
defensive player). Those awards will be handed
out after the season.
All those awards and nominations are very
impressive for any college athlete but especially
impressive for Alexander because he didn’t start
playing cornerback until his junior year of high
school. He grew up playing wide receiver but
made the switch to corner when he transferred
high schools. When the Charlotte, N.C., native
transferred, his new school already had established
wide receivers, but there was a need at corner.
So, he moved to the defensive side of the ball and
played corner full time but still managed to play
wide receiver part-time.
The 5-foot-11-inch, Alexander managed to be
the leading receiver in the Charlotte area during
his senior year at Rocky River High School. Despite
being the state’s most productive two-way player,
and being ranked as the fifth best player in the
state of North Carolina by Scout.com, he received
exactly zero scholarship offers from the from any
of the power-conference teams in North Carolina.
He was rated as a consensus 3-star athlete and the
No. 67 cornerback in the nation by Rivals.com.
The lack of big-time offers and low player ratings
didn’t seem to bother Louisville head coach Bobby