Perkins on board with Sun Devils

Arizona State picked up its third overall commitment of the 2015 class and first in-state pledge Wednesday when Chandler High quarterback Bryce Perkins told offensive coordinator Mike Norvell he was ready to join the program.

Perkins, the No. 12 dual-threat quarterback nationally, will now follow in the footsteps of his father Bruce, who played running back for the Sun Devils.

"It's crazy over here, especially my dad," Bryce Perkins said. "He's going crazy, he brought out his old Letterman jacket, all his old gear. I barely talked to him since I committed because he's on the phone with everyone telling them the news.

"I was thinking, me and my parents were thinking, if the best players stayed in Arizona, think about how good we can be, we can be a Top-5 team in the country. The coaches are doing a really good job and I have my support network all here, so it just made sense for me to stay true to ASU."

Importantly, ASU has told the 6-foot-3, 205 pound Perkins he'll be given an opportunity to play quarterback first. He was initially offered several years ago by the Sun Devils as an athlete, but continued to refine his mechanics and work to make coaches see him at the position he most desired to play. Arizona, Northwestern and UCLA had also reportedly offered scholarships.

That's what I want to do in college," Perkins said. "I want to play quarterback, so just making sure I focus on my mechanics and all I can do to accomplish that. "My progress has been a lot. Coming out my freshman year I'd only played quarterback for a year or two years before that so I was very mechanically unsound so I've worked on it every day, and just watching film on the best quarterbacks, Tom Brady, Drew Brees, just watching film makes me that much more sound.

"I look like a quarterback now. I still have a lot of work to do of course but it's really a big difference now compared to where I was just a couple years ago so I know that I'll just continue to get better and better."

Perkins visited ASU practice Saturday along with his parents and brother Paul, a UCLA running back, and has spent quite a bit of time around the program in the last year or so. It's led to a cumulative effect that has convinced him staying in town is his best course of action for college.

"When I went down to practice this spring we went and had a meeting with coach Norvell and he said I saw you as a freshman and I saw you in summer league and he said he sees the progression in me," Perkins said. "He knows I can be an elite quarterback if I continue to [progress] like I have so far so he said he's looking forward to seeing what I can do at quarterback.

"I feel great about it but I'm not one to get emotional about it because it's just one step -- a big step toward everything I'm trying to work for. But everyone is congratulating me about it, it feels like i'm famous almost. It does feel pretty good."

Now, Perkins said he'll get down to the task of working to convince others locally to join him.

"Yes because we have so much talent in Arizona so hopefully I'm the spark of it," Perkins said. "If we get more committing, we can do some really special things, I really believe that."