A 15-year-old Alin Edouard wanted to know if he was good enough.

Edouard was a budding quarterback at Hialeah (Fla.) High School and people were starting to tout his speed and skill. He was quickly coined a natural and even had a highlight tape to show to colleges.

But he wanted to impress someone else.

At the time, Miami native Teddy Bridgewater was getting his feet wet as a freshman quarterback at Louisville and Edouard watched every one of his games. Edouard loved Bridgewater’s arm strength, footwork and ability to escape a collapsing pocket. He saw a lot of himself in the ascending Cardinal.

So Edouard shamelessly friended Bridgewater on Facebook and asked him to look at his game tapes.

“He had no clue who I was and didn’t even know I played football,” Edouard said. “But once I convinced him to look at them, he was really impressed and we became really close.”

Now the teenager on the computer screen is expected to sign his letter of intent to play at Syracuse on national signing day on Wednesday. In the last three years, Edouard’s pedigree as a dual-threat quarterback swelled in the Miami area, and he even verbally committed to play for the University of Miami (Fla.) in February of 2013.

Then the three-star quarterback grew wary of his commitment to the Hurricanes and — with Bridgewater’s help — opted to head one of Syracuse’s best recruiting classes in recent memory.

“I had to decide where I would have the best chance to succeed myself and with a team,” Edouard said. “Syracuse presented an opportunity for both.”

When Hialeah head coach Marc Berman first penciled Edouard onto his roster, the sophomore standing in front of him wasn’t a quarterback.

Edouard was fast. Really fast. And had the necessary build. But he had only thrown a football in the street, and neighborhood football didn’t exude a polished signal caller.

That considered, Berman projected Edouard to play tight end or even on the defensive line. Then he picked up a ball and threw it 71 yards in the air flat-footed.

“That was the first time I saw him play and it was one of those things that kind of just happened,” Berman said. “Right there I decided we’d start developing him as a quarterback.”

As Edouard’s ability became apparent, those surrounding the Hialeah program wanted to see him on the field. They pressured Berman to start the young quarterback, but he insisted on deliberate, steady growth that would couple Edouard’s skill with a concrete understanding of the game.

Then when Berman finally started Edouard at the end of his sophomore season, he woke a sleeping giant. Months of preparation yielded a young quarterback that could not only throw and run, but read coverages, block out of the backfield and sense pressure on his blindside.

“Once he started, there really was no reason to ever take him off the field,” Berman said.

It all made his eventual commitment to Miami more inevitable than anything else.

The Hurricanes made him feel like a top priority. It was his dream school, and when those two paths collided, his family and friends were overjoyed at the prospect of watching him play for four more years.

Then the doubt set in.

Miami recruited quarterbacks Brad Kaaya and Malik Rosier — four-star and three-star prospects, respectively, both ranked higher than him. Edouard used to be able to call the office and talk to a coach at any time of the day. Now the phone kept ringing.

He used to get up and only think about playing in the city that gave him his name. A raucous crowd of green and orange. His childhood in one section of Sun Life Stadium and his future — rows of NFL scouts — in another. But now he questioned that vision and the future that had been inescapably carved out for him.

“It just started to not feel right anymore,” Edouard said, “a little less right every day.”

Bridgewater understood the position Edouard was in.

When he was being recruited out of Miami Northwestern (Fla.) High School, he was also coaxed by the Hurricanes and had a city of fans, friends and family whispering in his ear. But after visiting Louisville, Bridgewater realized it was important to experience another place, and let another place experience him.

Three years later, it was also important to Bridgewater for Edouard to see the benefits of his decision.

“If I didn’t leave Florida to go showcase my talent somewhere else, I wouldn’t have reached my full potential,” Edouard said Bridgewater told him. “People here know you are good so it’s time to show that to someone else.”

Four unprecedented seasons at Louisville have Bridgewater projected to be a top pick in the upcoming NFL Draft, all the evidence Edouard needed. He verbally committed to the Orange on Oct. 20.

“It all made sense to me,” Edouard said. “Teddy was someone who was telling me what was best for me, not anybody else. All he ever says to me is that he wants me to be better than him.

“And going away from home could allow me to do that.”

Now Edouard is the self-appointed ambassador of Syracuse’s incoming class. He actively plugs the Orange on Twitter, often texts players he knows about SU and has, on many occasions, dubbed his group as the one that will push Syracuse over the top.

With the help of offensive coordinator George McDonald, SU has established a recruiting pipeline from Florida to Central New York. Edouard’s also at the center of that, as five Florida natives have pledged to the Orange since he committed.

That list includes three-star tight end Adley Enoicy (Delray Beach, Fla.) who verbally committed on Sunday, and three-star wide receiver Steve Ishmael (North Miami Beach, Fla.) who pledged to the Orange on Tuesday.

“He’s always texting me,” Ishmael said. “No matter what I was doing recruiting-wise he would be sure to let me know that Syracuse was a great option for me.”

When Edouard officially visited Syracuse on Jan. 17, it was the first time he had seen the campus. He arrived at night so when he woke up in his hotel room the next morning, he walked to the window to see his future home in daylight.

That’s when Edouard saw something he had never seen before. Snow. Snow on the ground. Snow covering cars. Snow streaming out of the sky.

He stood at that window for a while and smiled.

He was a long way from sunny Miami — in miles and temperature — but it was new, and he liked it.

Said Edouard: “When I saw that snow coming out of the sky something inside of me was just saying that the future here holds great things.”

Published on February 4, 2014 at 9:44 pm

Contact Jesse: jcdoug01@syr.edu | @dougherty_jesse