Florida assistant athletic director of recruiting strategy Katie Turner quickly won over the hearts of many Gators fans when she trolled former coach Dan Mullen for telling reporters on the Monday after the Georgia game that he won’t talk about recruiting because it’s not in season. She tweeted shortly after her hiring, “Gator Nation – I am SOOO excited to get to work!!! I promise, recruiting time is never out of season!!! Now, let’s have go have some fun.”
Her impact in recruiting has already been felt as prospects have raved about how much they enjoy her. The Athletic’s G. Allan Taylor wrote an excellent feature about her rise in college football and how Napier made a home-run hire when he convinced her to flip from the Bulldogs to the Gators.
Turner got her start in college football when she volunteered to become a recruiting hostess nine years ago at Alabama. There, she impressed Crimson Tide recruiting operations coordinator Candice Rosenkranz, as well as full-time staffers like Napier, Kirby Smart and offensive analyst Keary Colbert. She helped Alabama land four No. 1-ranked recruiting classes, according to the 247Sports composite.
By her senior season, Alabama coach Nick Saban asked Turner to render her own evaluations of players and family members she hosted. She then earned an internship with the Buffalo Bills working in community relations and business development after graduation.
Napier and Turner’s paths crossed again in 2017 when he made her the director of football on-campus recruiting at Louisana-Lafayette.
“You were the best recruiter at Alabama,” he told her. “You convinced parents that Alabama was the best choice for their son to play football. I need you to help bring that culture to Louisana.”
She aided Napier’s efforts in landing the top-ranked recruiting class in the Sun Belt in 2019 and 2020 after the previous three classes ranked fifth or lower.
In January of 2020, Smart came calling and hired her as the director of recruiting operations. Then when Napier was hired at Florida, he knew he had to try to pry Turner away from the Gators’ fiercest rival.
If things were equal, she may have stayed with Georgia who was on the verge of a national championship, but Napier and Florida offered her an assistant athletic director title with a salary nearing $200,000, according to The Athletic’s source.
Many former coaches who worked with Turner raved about her abilities, which makes her a home-run hire for Napier and the Gators.
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