Hawkeyes land QB Alex Padilla
The Iowa Hawkeyes have landed their quarterback in the Class of 2019. After earning a scholarship offer this past week following an impressive performance at Iowa’s camp, Colorado native Alex Padilla decided there was no need to wait around any longer. The 6-foot-1, 191-pound Padilla made the call and committed to the Hawkeyes today.
“When I went to camp out there, just visiting the entire campus and seeing all of the facilities, it really just felt like home,” Padilla told HawkeyeReport.com. “That’s what really made the decision for me. It’s a place that I could see myself at even if football went away. I just really felt at home there.”
A three-star prospect, Padilla chose Iowa over scholarship offers from Colorado State, Nevada, Central Michigan, North Texas, Cornell, Columbia, Dartmouth, Penn, Yale, South Dakota, and Northern Colorado, along with interest from Utah, Oregon State, and Indiana, among others.
“I just don’t think there’s any other school that’s going to come along that would be a better offer or a better place for me to go than Iowa,” said Padilla. “I just love it there.”
Overall, Padilla is commitment No. 10 for the Hawkeye coaching staff in 2019 as he joins Ezra Miller, Logan Lee, Tyler Endres, Noah Fenske, Jack Campbell, Sebastian Castro, Jestin Jacobs, Desmond Hutson, and Jake Karchinski in Iowa's recruiting class.
Padilla is on track to graduate high school a semester early, which would allow him to enroll at Iowa in January of 2019 and go through spring practice next year. That will be the next step in a journey that started several years ago with a dream of becoming a Division I quarterback.
"It’s kind of like walking on water right now," Padilla said. "It’s been a dream of mine to play big-time college football since I was little kid, so it’s just a dream come true."
As a junior, Padilla put up big numbers at Cherry Creek High School, completing 67.7% of his passes for 2,678 yards and 40 touchdowns.
See highlights from Padilla’s junior year in the video below.