The Runaway Football Mom Who Stole Her Star Player's College Decision

Alex Collins is top-tier high school running back, and on Monday night he made the surprise announcement that he was going to play football at Arkansas next year. He was all but a signature and a fax away from committing — until his mom stole his paper work this morning and went on the lam on National Signing Day.

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Collins grew up in Plantation, Florida, and he was a something of a lock in the college-football rumor mill to play for his hometown Miami Hurricanes next season. But Collins took meetings with a few other schools, and surprised some people when he announced his intention to head to Fayetteville to play for the Razorbacks instead. Collins doesn't have a great relationship with his mother — he lives with his high school football coach — but she wanted him to stay and become a Hurricane. So Monday morning Collins was supposed to sign his letter of intent at his high school in a big ceremony. Then something fishy happened: 

And then the truth came out: 

ESPN's Corey Long reports that Collins's mother, Andrea, showed up at the school Monday morning, stole her son's, letter of intent and ran away before he could fax it to Arkansas to make his commitment official. Collins is 18 years old, so he's not a minor, but he still needs a parent's OK because NCAA rules state you need a parent's signature if you're under 21. And moms are moms, you know? You kind of have to work around them with these things. 

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For now, Collins remains only a verbally committed Arkansas recruit. Multiple sources are indicating the issue should be resolved by the end of the day and Collins will go to Arkansas as planned. Should he not be able to convince his mother to agree to let him to Arkansas, Collins may have to track down his father and get him to sign the papers.