Only one school in the PAC-12 offered Nikko Reed, and he took it sight unseen.
It was the Covid year, December 2020, so he didn't do any campus visits, just a couple of Zoom calls with the coaches. Brian Michalowski offered him in April, then he got to know Demetrice Martin after that. Both are now at Oregon. His other offers were from Air Force, Army, Eastern Washington and Fresno State.
Not many kids from his school got a chance to play college football anyway. Moreau Catholic in Hayward, California plays in the Mission Valley Athletic League, in the smallest division of California football. A year ahead of him Fresh Isom, a tailback, rushed for over 2,000 yards. Isom only got offers from Howard, William & Mary, Northern Colorado and Dixie State.
Plus, Nikko was only 5-10, 160, and that was his program height and weight. A low three-star prospect from a no-name school in an industrial town wedged between San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland, he played mostly receiver, caught 32 passes for 661 yards and scored 10 touchdowns. He added 299 on kicks and 220 on punts, giving him 1,328 all-purpose yards as a senior. On defense, he had 31 tackles and five interceptions. A small guy, but smart and tough. A competitor, like Steph Curry, the athlete most Bay Area kids looked up to.
He came to college having to learn to play cornerback against bigger and faster players on the last place team in the league. Despite all the adversity and obscurity, Nikko thrived, stubborn as a mushroom at the base of a dying tree.
He played in every game as a freshman and in the last game of the season he started. In a 20-17 win over Washington on November 20th he picked off a pass in the end zone early in the fourth quarter, shading the intended receiver perfectly.
Against #19 Utah in the final game, he fielded the second half kickoff three yards deep in the end zone, bounced free from three tacklers at the 15, sped up the sideline, cut back at the 50 and scored a 100-yard touchdown to make it 14-13.
At the team banquet they presented him the Lee Willard Award as the most outstanding freshman. Not bad for a kid from Hayward, the last player signed, sight unseen.
Last season as a sophomore Nikko started every game, fifth on the team in tackles with 34, one sack, two tackles for loss, one tackle for zero, four third down stops, one fumble recovery, and seven pass break ups.
In the Buffs only win of the year 13-10 in overtime at Folsom Field against California, with the Bears driving he recovered a fumble in the fourth quarter.
Here's the one thing you need to know about Nikko Reed: in the last three games of the year, on a 1-11 team that would lose those games 55-17, 54-7 and 63-21, Reed kept competing.
USC's Caleb Williams only threw five interceptions all last year, but in the first quarter of their game with Colorado he set up to pass deep down the middle to Brenden Rice.
The next week Reed would have six tackles against Washington, and in the finale against Utah he posted five, plus an interception he returned 56 yards.
No matter how bad it got in Colorado, Nikko Reed just kept playing better football. This is one player Deion Sanders shouldn't have run out of town.
When he got to Oregon he said to Hayes Fawcett of On3 Sports, “These guys are ready to win, and everyone has a background of winning. I’m all about it here and doing it right away!”
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