Q&A with coach Mike West, CEO of Gameplan University

There are many people involved when it comes to helping prospects with recruiting. If it wasn't for high school coaches, 7-on-7 trainers, parents and mentors, there would be many hidden gems left over without any offers.

Mike West is the CEO of Gameplan U, an organization that specializes in helping youth athletes develop athletically & academically in an effort to help them earn scholarships and get put on college coaches radar. West played football at Hampton University, is a high school football talent scout and former coach at Pro-Vision.

Along with coaching and mentoring Cale Sanders Jr. since his middle school days, he has also worked with 2020 OL commit Caleb Rogers and Texas Tech RB Ta'Zhawn Henry among others. We caught up with West to get his take on the newest Texas Tech commit.

Mike West: "We're an organization that helps mentor student-athletes, focusing on assisting and development in academics and athletics and also just career development and career training. For me, I majored in sports management, I played college ball and briefly in the NFL, two years on the practice squad. Throughout my process, I felt like I wasn't properly prepared to enter the real world, which is the world that 99 percent of us end up in. So that's kind of where Gameplan U is aiming to help.

I was a high school football coach and I was proud of the kids in our program, but the reason I stopped coaching high school football is I feel like I got to a point where I wanted to reach out to more kids. So I started working with the youth. We primarily start off with middle school kids, simply because by the time a kid gets to high school you've missed a lot of those pivotal years in development. So I start off with 11-year olds and youth football kids, and Cale was one of my first kids when I started working. Cale was in the sixth or seventh grade when he entered our program.

So that's a brief snapshot of what Gameplan U is. We assist in terms of academic performance, ACT performance, we have classes where they come in and we give them ACT tutoring and help them practice on that test. We facilitate and help them schedule the test and all that good stuff. Career planning, we talk to them about the different passions that they have and try to plant those seeds so that they pursue that career as well as playing ball in high school and college. So that's pretty much what Gameplan U is."

West: "The thing I like about CJ is I've been around the game and I consider myself one of the best at evaluating kids, from an early age and just football in general and the thing about CJ is he's just a football player. I mean since he was in middle school, wherever you put CJ at he competes. You can put him at running back, you can put him at defensive back, you can put him wherever, he's going to compete and he's going to compete at a very high level and be one of the best players at that position.

You go back and look at CJ's early film, CJ has played linebacker for New Caney, he's rushed the passer, he's played DB, he's played running back, he can pretty much play anything. He's one of the best in the district at all of those positions. I think he got 2nd team All-District at linebacker if I'm correct.

The thing about him in terms of football is just he's a high level competitor and that's the biggest and most important aspect that I tell all my kids that aspire to go and play college football. You have to be a competitor, you have to be a first-class, high-level competitor and that's CJ.

He's going to compete, he's been in our program for a while, with my 2018 class he was in the eighth grade competing and training against high school kids. So when it comes to football it doesn't get much better than CJ when it comes to competitive nature."

West: "Part of what I do is I have a background in media and part of our organization is a sports media company and I work with NFL clients and help with their branding, everything they do from a brand perspective. So my whole point in saying that is I'm very savvy in the sports media field.

The thing that hurts CJ is, and these are things I've talked to his family about, is I have a system that works for a lot of our kids that have come through the program. But CJ is just not that kind of kid and his family is not that kind of family. They're more of a 'West Virginia hard hat' family.

His dad is a firefighter and his mom is a great family mom. They have very strong family morals and they're a non-traditional family of today's sports world. They believe in hard work, CJ doesn't care about popularity and being a high profile recruit and all that kind of stuff. He's just not like that and his family is not like that.

We've had those discussions about putting his recruiting campaign together but one thing about what I do is I don't force the issue. If that's not the identity of that kid or that family, I'm not going to force them to promote their brand. So I think that's where he took a hit at in terms of his recruiting and a big component of that is who he is.

He's played a lot of positions because that's where the team needed him to play. If he would have played cornerback as a freshman things could have gone a lot differently but they needed him to play running back. CJ was getting 20+ carries as a freshman in their district. How many 14-or-15-year-old kids can play 5A or 6A Texas high school ball and carry the ball 25 times a game? You can't find that. So he's playing running back, he's very undersized as a freshman and he wasn't recruitable.

I had Zach Evans (2020 5-star back) as a freshman, I had Dwight McGlothern as a freshman (4-star 2020 DB). They were recruitable kids. Dwight was playing varsity at 6-foot-1, he had all the things you looked for.

Cale was 5-foot-10, maybe 165 pounds and playing running back, so how do you pitch that as a recruitable kid? That's where he took a hit in terms of his popularity and his recruiting but Texas Tech is getting an amazing steal. I work all across the state doing camps and events, and Texas Tech is getting one of the top prospects in the 2021 class.

That's how their family is. His dad feels like they don't do all the promotional stuff and the gimmicks in terms of recruiting, and Texas Tech saw CJ for how talented of a player he was without that so they're 100 percent committed. Regardless of what may come later, they're firm believers in being loyal to the people who believed in them and Tech is going to get an amazing steal."

Mike: "I think they're doing a phenomenal job. I've personally been impressed with just some of the talent that they've picked up, guys they've offered and they've earned my respect just by the way they've evaluated talent.

I've had a few kids, I had one in particular who was not heavily recruited but he was very talented, Caleb Rogers. He came to one of my lineman camps and I knew he was going to be the best lineman in 2020 that I had seen. He didn't have a bunch of offers but Tech offered him and he ended up committing. So I've been very impressed with their evaluation of kids and not just the high profile ones because those are easy. But actually getting some kids that are talented but don't have the hype. That lets me know that they actually evaluate.

I didn't know too many of the coaches coming in but I did know Kerry Cooks, simply because OU recruits a lot of my kids and he's recruited a few of my defensive backs. Other than that I didn't know too many coaches on the staff but I'm very impressed with what they're doing from an evaluation aspect."

West: "For 2022, I have two amazing lineman that are probably two of the best that I've had in our program. Kam Dewberry, he's out of Atascocita, he's very popular and he's one of the top recruits for 2022.

I have another lineman that Texas just actually offered in Austin this weekend and he doesn't have many offers yet but he will. His name is Kelvin Banks Jr. and he's at Summer Creek high school. I think he's 6-foot-5, 300 pounds. Left tackle so he's going to be a big prospect that's very early in his recruitment and teams that jump on him now will definitely benefit because he's going to be one of those guys that gets a lot of steam.

For 2023, I have an amazing freshman running back out of El Campo high school. His name is Rueben Owens II and he reminds me of Zach Evans his freshman year. He's that talented. He's going to be major, he doesn't have any offers yet, there are a few that are close to pulling the trigger but he's going to be one to remember for Texas Tech fans."