Southern Arizona Athletic Talent... not going to University of Arizona?

Southern Arizona is growing rapidly and the athletic competition amongst this ever growing populous is increasing just as fast as the population.

Major Universities continue to pay more and more attention as the amount of gifted athletes continues to emerge from the Southern Arizona sports scene.

Kristofer O’Dowd of Tucson’s Salpointe High School is the starting center for the Number One nationally ranked USC Trojans. Big surprise he chose USC over Arizona.

Southern Arizona does have a variety of skilled athletes. High School phenoms such as Andy Garcia of Nogales High School and Amphitheater High School’s Chris Johnson display their remarkable skills weekly in some of the best high school football played anywhere.

Garcia averaged 13 yards a carry while running for 292 yards and four touchdowns this Friday night. His talent exemplifies a problem skilled youngsters have in the border and the purpose of this blog.

This isn’t a blog created in order to discuss just border sports but to provide information to cover every detail the major media outlets will miss.

There is a lot of talent to be displayed and few media outlets to cover these gifted players who have a strong desire to demonstrate their skillets to the major Universities throughout the Country.

As of today Rivals.com ranks the University of Arizona 2009 recruiting ranking as 58th in the country behind schools such as Tulsa and Baylor University. Only one player, Jake Fischer, a Linebacker for Ironwood Ridge High School is from Tucson, Arizona. As the team continues to struggle it should become apparent the University should continue to try its hardest to keep its best athletes home. The 2008 roster only records five players as being from Tucson and with a population of 518,956, this is simply unacceptable.

Remember that statement about Center Kristofer O’Dowd playing for the number one ranked USC? A local Tucson athlete leaves the local University for a rival school and this should never happen to a community with as much pride as Tucson has for its local University. The media needs to strive to pay more attention to the local athletes and the University of Arizona needs to work to continue to keep special tabs on Southern Arizona’s special athletes.