Syracuse Football: 3-Star DB Lamar Dawson Commits To Orange For 2014

Honestly, I'll take a Twitter announcement over a pick-from-series-of-hats announcement any day of the week. Kudos to St. Rita of Cascia High School DB Lamar Dawson for going that route when choosing to play for the Syracuse Orange in 2014.

I'm committing to Syracuse university

— ☞LAMBO DAW☞ (@LamarDawson) July 27, 2013

The ninth verbal commitment of the '14 class, Dawson is rated three stars by Scout, three stars by ESPN and two stars by Rivals. The 6'0", 190-LB corner received offers from Michigan St., Cincinnati and just about every MAC school aside from Akron.

He told Michael Cohen why he chose SU over all of them:

"I just felt like it was the best situation for me and my family also," Dawson said. "I know a lot of people up here, and they were supporting me. I wanted to visit Syracuse just to make sure. My top three was Syracuse, Michigan State and Cincinnati. I had visited two of those three. I went to Michigan State; it was good. But I didn't know how early I would play. I went to Syracuse, and they had two seniors in front of me. I felt like it's the earliest chance for me to play."

I have absolutely no problem with the "I'll play sooner" mentality. Whatever gets you here, three-starred recruit.

Dawson is the second Illinois commit in the 2014 class and confirms that SU is really stepping outside its base to mine talent and make up for the talent gap in the ACC.

Whether you like it or not, it sounds like the "Syracuse Twitter army" was kindof a factor for Dawson, who received a lot of attention from weirdo SU fans (which may include you, so, sorry).

Dawson said of the schools in his top three, Syracuse had the most supportive and relentless fans. It made him feel wanted, made him feel at home, made him seal the deal Saturday. "The fans on Twitter, I just think they care about their football team," Dawson said. "I didn't get that much love from any other school."

I still think that stuff is eventually going to get noticed by the NCAA, who will then look to make an example out of someone, but, for the moment, it seems to be a help and not a hinderance. Just do us all a favor and only tweet positive stuff? Kthxbai.