Althoff’s Augustine commits to McKendree

Record-breaking Althoff High senior quarterback Jordan Augustine, the Belleville News-Democrat Small-School Football Player of the year, has made a verbal commitment to Division II McKendree University in Lebanon and will sign with the Bearcats in February.

The 6-foot-2, 180-pound senior set school records for passing yards (3,720, 11th all-time in Illinois) and touchdown passes (40, 18th all-time in Illinois) while helping lead the Crusaders (13-1) to the Class 4A state championship game.

“Their coach recruited me the hardest and made me feel the most wanted,” said Augustine, who had offers from other NCAA Division II schools Missouri Western State and Missouri S&T and an opportunity to walk-on at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. “I definitely wanted to stay close to home, that was a big part of it, too. They want their quarterback to make a lot of decisions on his own ... they run the spread and the hurry-up like we did at Althoff, too.”

Augustine completed 232 of his 330 passes (70.3 percent) and in two season as Althoff’s starter threw for 5,419 yards and 54 touchdowns with 18 interceptions.

Check out Jordan Augustine’s BND Player of the Year story here

“He was perfect for what we did and I think that’s what people saw,” Althoff coach Ken Turner said. “He had the numbers and I thought he was good as far as understanding what to do in the spread offense. He’s a smart kid and a good athlete.

“I’m happy as long as he feels comfortable with the school and program. There’s some good coaches over there and they’ll take care of him. I’m happy with his decision.”

McKendree is coming off an 8-2 season and was second in the Great Lakes Valley Conference. The Bearcats are graduating star senior quarterback Isaac Fisher, who threw for 2,792 yards and 21 TDs and also was the team’s leading rusher with 803 yards and nine TDs.

Four other quarterbacks remain on the roster and sophomore Brendan Fred saw the most action last season, appearing in 10 games.

The others are sophomore Elcee Burke, redshirt freshman Reece Metcalf and freshman Blake Hulsey.

“Going over (McKendree) film there were a lot of similarities and concepts, it was a lot of the same things we did at Althoff,” Augustine said. “I like the offense and how much the quarterback is involved.”

McKendree also picked up another recent area commitment from Freeburg linebacker Michael Smith.

In other area recruiting news, Edwardsville senior running back Kendell Davis has committed to Missouri Baptist.

Davis (5-7, 170) ran the ball 101 times for 623 yards and 12 touchdowns last season for the 9-1 Tigers.

This story was originally published January 23, 2016 at 3:17 PM with the headline "Althoff’s Augustine commits to McKendree."