WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif. – Duke Lemmens' bedroom is filled with recruiting memorabilia. His high school jersey from Oaks Christian is framed downstairs. His mother, Alice, keeps letters from all the colleges.
There are so many. Northwestern and Arizona are two of them she grabbed. There is a Notre Dame letter with coach Charlie Weis' signature. The Irish showed late interest but Lemmens' heart was with Florida.
"Two weeks before it ended, Justin Trattou, who is Duke's best friend, he de-committed from Notre Dame and because Notre Dame had (high school teammate) Jimmy Clausen and Notre Dame is losing a defensive end they knew all about Duke and called up Duke and said we'd like you to come out and take a look at this," said Lemmens' father, Rick. "We said how often do you have a chance for free to go see Notre Dame? At the last second, he said, 'No, I don't want to do that. I committed to Florida.'"
"He's very loyal," Alice said.
So Lemmens signed with the Gators and was a member of their 2007 recruiting haul, the top-rated class nationally by Rivals.com. He turned down California – the state and the school.
Rick played football for UCLA. His son had chosen a different path. One that was more than 2,400 miles away and terribly difficult to get to. It is no secret, Rick said, that at first he was not thrilled about the idea of his son playing college football all the way across the country. Lemmens could have picked Cal or Stanford or Oregon. Texas A&M recruited him. So did Arizona and Arizona State and a host of schools closer to home.
But on his official visit to Florida, Lemmens decided to commit. He fell in love with the campus, the idea of playing in the SEC – which he has called college football's best conference. Rick, who also made the trip to Gainesville for the official visit, did not learn for a few days that his son had committed. That was difficult to swallow.
"It's not that I didn't like Florida," Rick said. "We're the only California guy now. They have that receiver from Roseville (Carl Moore) but he's more of a grown man. I came back thinking they were going to offer him and I knew my son was going to say yes. I just assumed he'd come back and tell us and we'd have our chance to air everything out. He tells me a couple days later and it's on the Internet and I was a little mad."
There still seems to be a sense that Rick wanted to see his son play closer to home. A weekend trip to Berkeley would have been nice, he said. The Lemmens' did not make any games last year – but watched all of them on television – not because they didn't want to go but the weekend trip is too difficult and they wouldn't be able to see Duke for very long.
But Rick also said he did not want to make Duke's decision for him and that the family is happy that he's happy. And Lemmens seems happy at Florida.
He performed well in spring practice and will be fighting for playing time at defensive end as a sophomore. Lemmens had four tackles and led the Orange team with one sack in the Orange and Blue spring game two weekends ago. Playing time is something left up to the coaches, Rick said. In town for the spring game, Rick said he agreed with coach Urban Meyer when he addressed the parents.
"When I was back there this last week for the game and Urban Meyer addressed the parents, it's something I totally respect and I agree with him 100 percent, that there are too many parents that are too involved in a critical nature," Rick said. "Why is my son not playing more? That's never been an issue for us.
"Duke is going to get what he earns. No more. We know those coaches are paid big bucks to decide who those guys are. Whoever plays, that is their decisions and we're 100 percent behind him."
Last season was a big learning experience, Lemmens and his father said. He had shoulder surgery in March prior to his arrival at Florida which stalled his strength training.
Lemmens is big and strong but compared to some of his SEC opponents, he still has a long way to go. One play last season when Lemmens was matched up against Ole Miss' Michael Oher, a 6-foot-5, 325-pound offensive lineman, exemplified just how far behind Lemmens was from a physical standpoint.
"When you have that surgery, you're stuck," Rick said. "He's always been a strong kid and a hard worker in the weight room. But it's tough when you're one year behind playing in the SEC.
"There's this one play where it looks like Duke's mind says it's going to be a run block and he's trying to fight the block off and it turns out it's a rollout going the other direction. Oher gets into him, grabs him by his jersey, pulls him up and leans back and there's Duke dangling. My whole point is you go in as a high school kid. You go in not as strong as you could be or should be because you had surgery and you're playing against (grown) men. It's a different world."
Lemmens, rated as the No. 29 strong-side defensive end and No 55 recruit in the California top 100 of 2007, is adjusting to that world. He has gained weight. He's still working diligently to develop more upper-body mass. He looked significantly bigger in spring practice than he did last fall. There is a battle going on at defensive end and Lemmens will be in the rotation.
Hard work is something Lemmens has never backed down from. During his recruitment, he preferred when coaches challenged him. It might be one reason he ended up at Florida. Quarterback John Brantley is Lemmens' roommate. Rick said Brantley's mother is a Godsend since she cleans up after them and helps in so many other ways. Punter Chas Henry and offensive lineman James Wilson are two of Lemmens' closest friends along with Trattou. Thousands of miles away from home, Lemmens is becoming a man.
"Florida was really good about it in the sense (former defensive line coach Greg) Mattison told him, 'You're going to have to come out to Friday Night Lights because we're not going to offer you a scholarship without seeing you,'" Rick said. "The bottom line was he wanted to go there. He wanted to prove himself. He was kind of tired of getting scholarships from people that said, 'We saw your film or we heard about you. Here's an offer.'
"He wanted to have somebody say, 'We know you. We've met you. We like you.' He went out to (Friday Night Lights) and he did excellently at this thing and he ran a 4.65 40 and they weren't prepared for a guy his size to do that. And then they offered him."
The rest is history.