All Roads Lead Home: How Tayven Jackson Ended up at Indiana
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To understand the process that resulted in Tayven Jackson's commitment to Indiana, one has to go back to the beginning.
The 16-year-old half-brother of Indiana basketball star Trayce Jackson-Davis had started to set himself apart from the class of 2022 prospects. The interested programs started emerging, and eventually Central Michigan would be the only program to beat Indiana in offering the pro-style quarterback from Center Grove. Former quarterbacks coach, Nick Sheridan, and head coach Tom Allen decided to pull the trigger on offering Jackson on April 4, 2020, near the end of his freshman year.
Still, NCAA recruiting guidelines state that programs can not come in contact with recruits of his then age unless the prospect initiates the contact.
Jackson did. Consistently.
Allen told reporters Sunday afternoon before Indiana's matchup with Michigan State in Assembly Hall that those talks were the very reason why the process took off as soon as Jackson entered the portal from Tennessee.
"As you may or may not know, early in the process we can't reach out to them," Allen said. "They have to be able to reach out to us. So, we had a scheduled time. He called me every Sunday afternoon and I loved those talks we had together. But he would have to initiate that in terms of he would have to call me. So, he was always awesome with that when he was only a sophomore in high school and just coming through the ranks."
As those Sunday afternoon talks carried on week-by-week, the offers started coming from bigger, and bigger schools.
August 2020: Cincinnati offers on the 4th. Michigan State, the 19th.
September 2020: Iowa and Minnesota extended offers on back-to-back days, the 19th and 20th as Jackson's Sophomore season began.
January 2021: Indiana began to fall in the hierarchy of offers, despite the weekly contact between Jackson and Allen. Arkansas, Florida State, Oregon, Michigan, and Texas A&M offered the Indiana native during the first month of the new year.
February 2021: Florida and Tennessee reached out offering Jackson.
March 12, 2021: Jackson announces his top nine schools. Indiana did not make the list despite their stellar season the year before.
Less than two months later, Jackson had committed to playing for Tennessee and head coach Josh Heupel in Knoxville.
Make no mistake, Jackson's arrival in Bloomington is the result of two sides making the best of a bad situation. Allen and offensive coordinator Walt Bell didn't expect quarterback Dexter Williams II to suffer a horrific injury, forcing him to have reconstructive surgery on his knee. Furthermore, Jackson didn't expect Tennesse to land Nico Lamaleeva, one of the most heavily recruited quarterbacks in recent history.
What makes Jackson's prior situation at Tennessee more complicated is that The Athletic's Stuart Mandel reported March 11, 2022 that a 5-star 2023 prospect had signed an NIL deal with a collective that could get up to $8 million, not specifying a player or school.
Lamaleave committed to Tennesee 10 days later, raising suspicion that the California native may have been the player attached to the report.
Competing with veteran quarterback Joe Milton and Lamaleava who will reportedly be making big money playing for the Volunteers left Jackson in a tough spot, ultimately leading him to the transfer portal and a return home to Indiana.
"...It happened pretty quickly; when he made the decision to go in the portal and then reached out to us, but bottom line was we already had that relationship built," Allen said.
The pool of potential quarterbacks had slimmed by the time Jackson chose the Hoosiers. Mike Wright from Vanderbilt and Chance Nolan from Oregon State were the other two names with the most traction. Solid options, but most would probably admit that landing Jackson from Tennessee was the best outcome for Indiana when presented with those three passers.
"What we liked about him was his athleticism," Allen said. "He's a long athlete, multisport guy, basketball, track, all three of those, and just felt like he could create with his legs, with his arm. He's a tremendous leader."
"Those are things you're looking for in a quarterback, the ability to throw the football and run the football. He's had dual effectiveness in high school and then you saw that even this past year in the time that he played at Tennessee."
Indiana will enter the spring with their guy at quarterback. Allen was non-committal on potentially adding another more seasoned quarterback, saying they were in no rush to bring anyone in.
However, it is now on Walt Bell to find a scheme that complements Jackson as Indiana's quarterback of the now, and of the future. Time will tell, but Allen has created momentum in a second straight offseason following an extremely disappointing regular season.
Something that shouldn't be taken for granted.
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