DL Michael Allen Commits to Wake Forest

Dave Clawson and the Wake Forest football team secured a massive commitment Monday in defensive lineman Michael Allen.

Michael Allen, a 4-star defensive lineman out of Georgia, committed to Wake Forest on Monday, with the Deacs beating out other finalists Southern California and Tennesssee to secure the highly-touted high school senior. Wake began picking up a late run of Crystal Ball predictions from 24/7 Sports over the last couple weeks and there was considerable momentum for Allen to commit to Clawson and the Demon Deacon football team. This momentum, and corresponding speculation of where Allen would land, became reality for Wake Forest this afternoon.

As discussed previously, Allen announced he would make his decision August 8:

Stage is set I will be committing ??August 8th 2016?? be on the lookout pic.twitter.com/mO4x2aBPrH

— Mike Allen (@bigmikeal) August 2, 2016

He made his announcement today around lunch time:

Let's get it #11Nation pic.twitter.com/UujhGFu9wt

— Mike Allen (@bigmikeal) August 8, 2016

Allen is a potential game-changer for Wake’s defense and program. He is a 4-star recruit on Rivals, and ranked as the 169th best player overall in the 2017 class. BSD expects Allen to come in and immediately start at defensive end. He has the versatility to rush the passer, but can also provide excellent coverage in the run game. If need be, he even has the athleticism to drop into coverage in certain situations.

For Wake Forest, Allen is one of the top recruits (if not the top) recruit in program history. Allen's signing signals the continued forward progress of recruiting under Clawson and provides Demon Deacon football fans with a lot of excitement for the 2017 recruiting class. Prior to Allen's commitment the 2017 class was ranked as the 47th best in the nation by 24/7 Sports and Allen is projected to push that ranking up to 43rd - which would be the best class in Wake Forest recruiting history. Allen is also ranked as the 169th best recruit overall in the class of 2017.

It would be difficult to overstate how big a commit Allen is for the Deacs. To go head to head with and beat out top tier programs like USC and Tennessee, who were also pursuing Allen provides the program with a lot of optimism moving forward. Clawson and his staff have shown an ability to not only get out and evaluate talent very well, but have indicated that they are a threat to land guys that they target as potential program changers.

Blogger So Dear welcomes Allen to the Wake Forest community and looks forward to seeing him sign with the Deacs and have a healthy and productive career in Winston Salem in the old gold and black. Welcome to Wake Michael!