News broke today that Colorado four-star commit Ashaad Clayton, the only verbally committed player in the Class of 2020 to not sign an NLI on Dec. 18 (not counting incoming blueshirt commit Jayle Stacks, had penciled in an OV to Florida, slated for late January.

While Colorado fans are likely to view this with an unmistakeable frown on their faces, the truth of the matter here is twofold: firstly, Colorado is very much still a horse in this race. Secondly, and frankly, get used to this kind of situation. It should be seen as the tip of the iceberg in terms of what the Buffaloes will have to deal with and fight through in the near future and beyond.

The backstory regarding my first point as to why Colorado obviously is still a strong contender to receive an eventual NLI from Clayton can be found here. This NOLA.com article from the second week of December outlines the rough multi-month stretch Clayton endured from May through mid-October.

Summing up, Clayton required meniscus surgery at the end of this past May. The aftermath of that surgery saw his scholarship offer list plummet from over 60 to less than five.

Clayton, who hails from New Orleans, had much interest in committing to the home-state LSU Tigers over the summer, but due to lingering worries about his injury, he was essentially turned down.

It doesn't take much insight to get a sense of what Clayton must have been feeling: bitterness, resentment, fear — the list goes on, but watching big-name programs yank scholarships without empathy or hesitation due to that surgery no doubt must have caused a flux of emotion within Clayton.

Mel Tucker and the Buffaloes moved in with an offer right around the time Clayton had began to prove that his injury and surgery were things of the past and not cause for continued concern. He OV'd to Boulder the weekend of Nov. 9 and committed to Colorado on the 11th.

Here's what Tucker had to say about a big part of his recruiting philosophy on Dec. 18 when introducing the Buffaloes' Class of 2020:

"You can't fake being all in, or being authentic, or caring about players, or caring about academics, or caring about education, and making these guys the best that they can be. That's not something that you can fake, and a lot of these guys will tell you that."

"Their Mom will tell you, their Dad will tell you, the kid will tell you, 'Hey, what stood out about Colorado is that they were real. We trust these guys.' The recruiting process is all about building trust. We always do what we say we're going to do and we proved that to these players during the recruiting process."

It's on that note that the Buffaloes should still be seen as strong contenders to hang onto Clayton — they were real with him, recruited him the right way, and showed him love as a young man and asset during a time where many other programs were seemingly doing the opposite.

While the Buffs are going to do their utmost to retain Clayton, and translate his verbal commit to a NLI, it certainly is not guaranteed that they'll pull it off.

Since committing, Clayton has visited Kansas on an OV and as I mentioned, today, GatorTerritory's Corey Bender reported that Clayton will visit Gainesville in late January officially.

This should not have come as a surprise. The smaller picture is that Clayton had a monster 2019 season and playoffs performance (see above video) — more schools were bound to make a run at him. But the bigger picture is that the situation CU is in currently, being in the midst of a recruiting battle which they potentially could lose, this is nothing more than a caveat that comes with the territory of where Tucker is trying to lead the program at Colorado.

The Buffaloes have entered new territory in terms of offering and recruiting talent from New Orleans, Louisiana and the Deep South in general — the SEC's backyard. A recruiting battle like this was bound to happen, if not now, then in the immediate future. And if Tucker indeed continues to keep the trajectory of this football program point upwards, expect more of the same in 2021, 2022 and beyond.

Take some pride in knowing other big programs want what you've got. If anything, the next few months with Clayton should serve as a good initial test for Tucker and his staff in regards to their ability to hang on to an out-of-state, high-profile guy.

A win in this case, with Clayton signing his NLI in February and becoming a Colorado Buffalo, would be a resounding success for Tucker and Co. plus a big boost for the Class of 2020.

A loss on the other hand, would be disappointing but certainly not debilitating.

Tucker in his first recruiting class can afford to lose a battle like this, but the biggest takeaway here is that if and as the Buffaloes continue to get better, keep winning and go from decent, to good, to great, intense recruiting battles like what's happening with Clayton will only start to become more regular.

Where Tucker is taking the program at Colorado ain't a walk in the park when it comes to securing the services of the nation's elite high school talent.