The Back-and-Forth Nature Of Nakobe Dean’s Week

Back in November, five-star linebacker Nakobe Dean realized he hadn’t packed enough clothes on his official visit to Georgia. To help, his mom ran over to the local CVS to grab him a shirt—a relatively cheap, red, long-sleeved t-shirt with an old school Bulldog logo and in big white letters reads ‘GEORGIA BULLDOGS.’”

Much like the purchase of the shirt, Dean’s commitment to Kirby Smart and the Bulldogs was spontaneous.

For a while now, the Horn Lake, MS native has been back and forth between UGA and Ole Miss. This week though, that indecisiveness was ramped up even more.

On Monday at the Alabama-Mississippi All-Star Game, Dean flashed the crowd the Landshark hand gesture, leading some to believe that Ole Miss was starting to pull away. And at the time, it seemed like that to Dean as well.

“It was about 50-50 UGA-Ole Miss,” Dean said after his commitment on National Signing Day. “[Ole Miss] was the top one at the time that I did that.”

But as the week moved on, he was still thinking. And thinking. And thinking.

Come actual signing day, insiders weren’t sure, friends and family had no idea because Dean himself still didn’t know. And sensing that uncertainty, everyone who could was reaching out to him to try and get in their closing arguments.

“Today was crazy,” Dean said. “I probably should have turned off my phone but I didn’t. So I gave the schools a chance and went back and forth.”

And at the end of it, he informed neither school if he was going or not. How Ole Miss figured the decision out was by an ESPN live-stream of the commitment ceremony. How Georgia was told was through a National Letter of Intent it received just a few minutes prior to the ceremony.

What pushed Georgia over the line? It wasn’t a closing pitch from Smart, but the relationship Dean had with him, outside linebackers coach Dan Lanning and inside linebackers coach Glenn Schumann. That, combined with the overall spectrum of things Georgia had to offer, earned Dean’s signature at the last second.

“I feel like they gave me overall everything,” Dean said. “They checked all the boxes… Development, on and off the field. Academically and athletically.”

Still, after deciding to opt away from the school of his home state, Dean still carries the pride of the state of Mississippi. A pride he plans to wear throughout his time in Athens and after.

“At the end of the day, I’m going to represent Mississippi wherever I go.”