By Jonathan Okanes
CONTRA COSTA TIMES
BERKELEY - Cal football coach Jeff Tedford woke up Wednesday morning expecting to announce a strong recruiting class of 24 players. By the time he got to Memorial Stadium for a news conference to discuss national letter of intent day, the class had grown to 26 players and gotten even stronger. Defensive back Chris Conte of Los Angeles and defensive end Ernest Owusu of Nashville, Tenn., signed with the Bears, something Tedford wasn't sure would happen when he went to bed Tuesday night. Those additions gave Cal the 12th-ranked recruiting class in the nation, according to scout.com. Rivals.com ranked the Bears incoming crop at No. 21. "We're real excited about our class," Tedford said. "We've addressed a lot of our needs. We have a lot of size and strength up front and a lot of speed and skill with our skill positions."
The Bears have just one player ranked in the top 100 by scout.com -- Salesian running back Jahvid Best at No. 94. But their class includes 12 four-star players and eight high school All-Americans. Rivals.com gave Cal's class five four-star recruits and 18 three-star players. Along with Best, the ninth-best running back in the country according to rivals.com, the class is highlighted by Matt Summers-Gavin of St. Ignatius-San Francisco, the No. 14-rated offensive guard by scout.com. The offensive line is the anchor of the class, with five offensive linemen signing with Cal on Wednesday. The Bears also added high school All-American Sam DeMartinis of Sherman Oaks and top-20 offensive line prospects Justin Cheadle of Bakersfield and Mitchell Schwartz of Pacific Palisades.
"I'm very pleased with our offensive line class," Tedford said. "They are guys who are very physical, and guys who are athletic. They're not big guys who can't move. They have size and they're very athletic." Adding Owusu completed an important four-player class of defensive ends, filling a pass-rushing need for the future. Cal signed Cameron Jordan from Chandler, Ariz. and Scott Smith of Honolulu, both of whom were recruited by several Pac-10 schools. Tedford said he woke up at 3:40 a.m. Wednesday to send a text message to Owusu, who picked Cal over Stanford, Washington, Vanderbilt and North Carolina. "He's an East Coast guy, so I had to get on him early," Tedford said. "He was on the bubble. We had no idea last night which way he was leaning. So this morning we were very, very pleased." Conte is considered a top-75 safety by both rivals.com and scout.com. He initially orally committed to Cal last summer but switched to UCLA last month. However, Conte had another change of heart and informed Tedford on Wednesday morning he was indeed coming to Berkeley. "We were kind of going back and forth with it and I think he was struggling a little bit with his decision," Tedford said.
"I felt like this was going to happen, but I just wasn't absolutely sure. I'm just really proud of Chris to follow through with what he told us he was going to follow through with."
The Bears also signed All-American Brock Mansion, a 6-foot-5 quarterback from Dallas. Mansion is one of 10 out-of-state players who signed with Cal. In the previous five years combined, Tedford signed 12 players from outside California. "We're going to be a little bit more proactive out of state," Tedford said. "We're not going to saturate the United States. We're still going to make sure we saturate California and the western United States with our resources. But there are certain areas where we've made some inroads, and we're going to continue to go to those places. In the last three years especially, I've seen our out-of-state recruiting really grow."
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