One of Middle Tennessee’s top junior college recruits has decided to switch his commitment to SEC powerhouse Ole Miss.
Detric Bing-Dukes announced via Twitter he plans to sign with Ole Miss, after previously committing to MTSU.
“This has been in the works with [Bing-Dukes] for the past two weeks now,” MTSU coach Rick Stockstill said. “Ole Miss finally pulled the trigger, so we started our research… It’s not like we’re just finding out about this today. We’ve been looking, we’ve been evaluating and we’ve been talking to some guys right now.”
The former four-star linebacker signed a national letter of intent with MTSU, but not meeting academic qualifications caused Bing-Dukes to not be able to sign with the team.
MTSU had plans of signing Bing-Dukes after he graduated from Iowa Western Community College, but after his recruiting opened up, the Rebels jumped in and offered him a scholarship.
“If he would’ve gotten his [associate’s] degree, then he would’ve been off limits to everybody, but because he didn’t get his [associate’s] degree in December, then his national letter of intent became null and void. He became recruitable by anybody and everybody, then,” Stockstill said.
It’s a devastating loss for the Blue Raiders, due in part to the graduations of former MTSU linebackers Trey Wafford, Cavellis Luckett and T.T. Barber, leaving the Blue Raiders in need of depth and talent at the linebacker position.
“We have to find another linebacker now,” Stockstill said. “We’ll scour the junior college ranks and we’ll see if there’s anybody out there that’s graduating and eligible to play.
“We’ll look at anyone that may be transferring and anything like that. We’ll just try to find another linebacker to replace him between now and this summer.”
Bing-Dukes earned JUCO All-American honors while at Iowa Western Community College.
He recorded 76 tackles, 2.5 sacks, two interceptions, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery while with the Reivers.
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