Indiana Preps | Recruit Indiana / The Turn
Friday night, Mason Oglesby picked up his phone and told the world he was going to Lawrence. Saturday morning, Indiana woke up and processed what happened. By Monday evening, Nick Vecrumba made it two.
Kansas has walked into Indiana’s backyard twice in five days and left with two of the 2027 class’s most coveted prospects. The state is paying attention. It should be.
The One That Stung
Oglesby chose Kansas over Indiana, Ohio State, and North Carolina — in a live broadcast on the Rivals YouTube channel that Indiana Preps and half the recruiting community had circled on their calendars. The four-star tight end from New Palestine is 6-foot-3, 215 pounds, caught 34 passes for 629 yards and six touchdowns as a junior while helping the Dragons win the Class 5A state championship, and also contributed 33 tackles and seven stops for loss as a defensive player. On3 ranks him as the No. 12 tight end nationally and the No. 9 overall player in Indiana for his class.
Indiana was widely expected to land him. Cignetti’s staff had been involved since February 2025, Oglesby took an official visit to Bloomington, and IU fans felt good about where things stood. The Hoosiers had a legitimate case — a national championship, a proven tight end development track that turned Riley Nowakowski into a fifth-round NFL pick, and the pull of playing at home in a program that just rewrote the standard for Indiana football.
It wasn’t enough. Oglesby said the chance to “write my own story” was the deciding factor. “I don’t want to be a guy who is in the program for four years but only plays one year. I want to go somewhere and leave a legacy and I feel like I can do that at a school like Kansas.”
The football side of the equation pointed squarely at offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki, who has built a reputation as one of the most tight end-centric offensive minds in the country. “They have a tight end-minded offensive coordinator,” Oglesby said. Early playing time, a specific role, and a program on the rise under Lance Leipold — that combination beat out a national champion and an Ohio State program with all the resources in the world.
The One That Followed
Vecrumba committed to Kansas on Monday after making an unofficial visit to Lawrence over the weekend — canceling upcoming official visits to South Florida and Louisville in the process. The 6-foot-5, 285-pound offensive tackle from Brownsburg chose the Jayhawks over Kansas State, Louisville, South Florida, Wake Forest, and more than 20 other FBS offers. “It feels like home, so why go anywhere else?” he said.
Kansas had one spot left on the offensive line and Vecrumba decided he didn’t need to wait for the official visit to know — he paid his own way to campus first, saw what he needed to see, and committed. That’s not a kid who was wavering. That’s a kid who made a decision.
He becomes the second straight Indiana commitment for Kansas’s 2027 class, and brings a pedigree worth noting — Brownsburg has won back-to-back Indiana 6A state championships under head coach John Hart.
The Kansas-Indiana Pipeline Is Real
This isn’t new. Lance Leipold’s staff has been coming to Indiana on a consistent basis since he arrived in Lawrence, and the results have shown up in signing classes. In the 2026 class, Kansas signed two Indiana players — Malachi Mills from Carmel and Robert Reddick from Indianapolis. In the 2025 class, Adrian Holley from Westville signed with the Jayhawks.
The connection predates Leipold as well. Ben Easters — the Brownsburg quarterback who committed to Kansas in 2019 and signed in the 2021 class — is the same school that just produced Vecrumba. Brownsburg has now sent talent to Lawrence twice in five years under the same head coach. That’s not a fluke. That’s a recruiting relationship.
Leipold has methodically rebuilt Kansas from one of college football’s most consistent losing programs into a program that can walk into Indiana — a national championship program — and take their top targets. He doesn’t do it with resources. He does it with a specific pitch: early playing time, genuine development, and a program that treats prospects like people rather than depth chart pieces to be acquired and managed.
Indiana’s high school athletes are responding to that pitch. Two of them just did it in the same week.
What It Means
Cignetti and the Hoosiers aren’t in a crisis. They’re the defending national champions with one of the most compelling recruiting stories in the country heading into the 2027 cycle. They’ll be fine. But the Oglesby and Vecrumba commitments are a reminder that winning a national title doesn’t automatically close every door in your own state.
Oglesby put it plainly when asked about the class he just joined: “The pieces are falling into place. I think with my commitment, there will be a few more people who will see the vision that I have in changing the program around.”
Kansas is building something in Lawrence. And they’re using Indiana talent to do it — again.
Indiana Preps covers high school athletics, recruiting, and athlete development across the state of Indiana.