When small forward D.J. Jeffries decommitted from Kentucky earlier this week, the immediate question was whether Memphis coach Penny Hardaway would change John Calipari’s recruiting model.

Today, the question is whether John Calipari has changed the model himself. Kentucky received a commitment from Pendleton County (Ky.) small forward Dontaie Allen. A 6-6 small forward, Allen is 247sports.com’s No. 145 player in the 2019 class, and their third best recruit in the state of Kentucky.

That said, while outsiders may perceive Kentucky’s decision to extend a committable offer to Allen as some sort of knee-jerk reaction to Jeffries, the truth is probably much more complex.

For one thing, Allen had an excellent summer, and among the coaches who had offered him were Louisville coach Chris Mack, Auburn coach Bruce Pearl and Oklahoma coach Lon Kruger.

For another, despite his reputation as the pursuer of one-and-dones, many of Calipari’s biggest recruiting successes have come from players who were at least somewhat under the radar. Most notably, while 5-star forward Kevin Knox was a significant presence on last year’s Kentucky squad, the team leader was Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who was a mere 4-star prospect, and was much less hyped than, say, Hamidou Diallo.

There also is the not irrelevant issue of recruiting Kentucky players. Since the Joe B. Hall or Eddie Sutton era, the non-recruitment of in-state prospects has been a sore spot with the Kentucky fan base. In defense of the coaches, many of the in-state players who were signed simply didn’t work out. The back end of Tubby Smith’s tenure was clogged with players like Brandon Stockton and Jared Carter.

Calipari doesn’t seem the sentimental type who will fill his bench with in-state kids just to make some sort of point. To be sure, his teams generally feature a couple of in-state walk-ons who see playing time in blowouts. But otherwise, Calipari has been pretty selective about recruiting Kentucky players.

He did not recruit, but inherited Mason County’s Darius Miller, although his patience with Miller helped the player become a solid contributor on the 2012 NCAA title team and eventually have a solid NBA career. Similarly, his first class included Jon Hood of Madisonville, who played little in Lexington, but Calipari had little to do with his recruitment.

Calipari didn’t sign an in-state recruit of his own until his 2013 class, when he similarly went under the radar to ink Derek Willis (No. 126 national recruit) and late-charging guard Dominique Hawkins (No. 192). The return on both was good — while Willis was a fairly enigmatic player, he was a talented contributor, and Hawkins emerged as a defensive stopper and leadership stalwart as an upperclassman. While the blue-chip guys ahead of them grabbed the initial minutes, Willis and Hawkins were four-year players, and evolved into the sort of heads-up veterans whom opponents hate to play against.

Since then, the Kentucky recruiting well has run dry on in-state talent. Last season’s team had no scholarship players from Kentucky, with the exception of forward P.J. Washington, who was born in Louisville, but moved away as an infant.

In Calipari’s defense, the Commonwealth hasn’t exactly been overflowing with college basketball talent. Since his recruitment of Hawkins and Willis, Calipari has passed up only six in-state recruits who were ranked as 4-star prospects. The two best of the bunch have been Louisville’s Quentin Snider and Ray Spalding, and the players who Calipari did recruit are certainly defensible alternatives to either.

Still, this return to Kentucky recruiting has been on the radar for a while. Kentucky zeroed in on Hopkinsville, Ky., guard KyKy Tandy early in the 2019 recruiting process, but his father publicly indicated that he was lukewarm on Kentucky, and that seemed to end UK’s recruitment of Tandy, who is 247sports.com’s No. 86 player in the 2019 class.

Being the bellweather in recruiting means that every move Calipari makes tends to get scrutinized for a deeper meaning. Could the Allen commitment signal that Calipari is diversifying his classes, and taking a greater interest in Kentucky’s homegrown players? Or was Allen part of his plan all along? Pondering this mystery should keep Wildcat fans engrossed at least until Big Blue Madness.