I went to school with Russell, we enrolled at the same time, and I could definitely point to many examples of his character and leadership. I was just talking about the way in which UM identified Russell as a recruit. Hubb Alexander went to Chicago to sign another player, DT Mel Agee (who decommitted at the last minute to sign with Illinois), and so we asked about other unsigned DL players in Chicago and found out about Russell. The scholarship opened up due to a flip, not an academic casualty (which, back then, you wouldn't find out about until August).
The only D-I school recruiting Russell was Indiana State (I'm a big Larry Bird fan, so I know about the Sycamores), and Russell had the grades to get into the Ivy League schools. Russell did very well at UM, academically and socially, and was tapped into Iron Arrow, the highest honor attainable at UM (the members of Iron Arrow wear their Seminole Indian jackets and go down onto the football field for the Homecoming pre-game festivities).
