Many might wonder why a 2010 nationally recruited quarterback from Colorado would have interest in Missouri.
For Colorado Steam Boat Springs signal caller Austin Hinder there are multiple reasons that the talented Scout.com four star prospect is very interested in the Tigers.
Hinder comes from a NFL background family; his grandfather is longtime St. Louis Rams coach Jim Hanifan. Hinder has spent a lot of time in St. Louis during the summers and holidays and has grown to love the Show Me State.
“I have been going to St. Louis and I’m very familiar with the state,” Hinder told InsideMizzou.com Tuesday night. “I’m very interested in Missouri for a lot of reasons.”
Another reason is that his mother graduated from the Columbia campus and he has been there a few times.
“Mom stresses how great a school it is,” Hinder said. “She had a great time there and tells me what a quality education I can get there.”
It appears that Hinder will look for a university where academics have a high standing as well as the quality of the football program.
“Location is one of the key factors for me,” Hinder explained. “I want to love the area where the school is located, where I will spend the next four or five years of my life at, I got to love the place.”
A couple other key factors that important to the highly rated quarterback are a team’s winning tradition and the personality of the coaching staff.
“The coaching staff is very important, I want to love to play for them, to lay it all on the line for them,” Hinder said. “It’s much easier to do that when you respect and love those guys, so the relationships I build with them are very important.”
Hinder, a 6-foot-4, 178-pound athlete, who runs a 4.8 forty, threw for over 1,600 yards and 14 touchdowns, he added another 750 yards rushing and another 10 scores.
Hinder has been very busy since the first of the year; it was ironic that he was in San Antonio during the same time the Tigers were there for the Alamo Bowl.
“I just got back from the US Army All-American Junior Combine,” Hinder said. “I earned first team combine honors. I was told that Scout.com may be considering bumping me up to a five star, one of the best quarterbacks in the country after my performance there.”
Schools that have currently offered Hinder are Cal, Stanford, Colorado, Colorado State, Kansas State and Nebraska.