Thinking about the recruiting landscape in the region

[Harry]

Times are changing in Texas and the surrounding region when it comes to college football.

North Texas, Louisiana Tech and UT-San Antonio are headed to Conference USA. SMU and Houston are joining the Big East.

And there are a whole lot of big questions about how those moves will impact each program, especially when it comes to the life blood of any football program — recruiting.

I bring it up because this next recruiting cycle will be the first since C-USA announced that it is adding UNT in 2013. UNT hasn’t won a lot of recruiting battles with its regional rivals in recent years, which is something that is going to have to change if UNT is ever going to get to where it wants to go.

The first of those wins came earlier this week when Pflugerville Connally quarterback Dajon Williams committed to play for the Mean Green. Williams was also offered by La. Tech.

The question is if that will be the first in a series that will help vault UNT to a higher level in the world of college football.

Well, maybe.

read more: http://meangreenblog.dentonrc.com/2012/06/thinking-about-the-recruiting-landscape-in-the-region.html/

[GrayEagle]

I don't know that North Texas really began a major climb with the commitment of Dajon Williams. Like most of our faithful, I hope that it's so but beating Louisiana Tech and Montana for a Texas recruit does not mean that we have turned the corner. Williams could turn out to be the best quarterback that we've had because I like his basics in size and speed but the analysts don't concur on a high rating.

Orangebloods rates him as the #8 quarterback recruit but they say that Rivals has given him a 5.7 rating. According to both the Rivals and The Old Coach websites he has not been rated. Scout does not list him at all and 247 gives him a very pedestrian grade of 75.

Until there is some agreement and elevation let's just say that I'm happy to get him but not ready to say that this is a breakthrough on recruiting.

[Harry]

I don't know that North Texas really began a major climb with the commitment of Dajon Williams. Like most of our faithful, I hope that it's so but beating Louisiana Tech and Montana for a Texas recruit does not mean that we have turned the corner. Williams could turn out to be the best quarterback that we've had because I like his basics in size and speed but the analysts don't concur on a high rating.

Orangebloods rates him as the #8 quarterback recruit but they say that Rivals has given him a 5.7 rating. According to both the Rivals and The Old Coach websites he has not been rated. Scout does not list him at all and 247 gives him a very pedestrian grade of 75.

Until there is some agreement and elevation let's just say that I'm happy to get him but not ready to say that this is a breakthrough on recruiting.

Until just recently La. Tech was beating us consistently on key recruits. So in that respect it is a good development but I agree we still have a ways to go. This year we should see some dividends from Mac. My philosophy is this, in Texas there are probably 50-75 guys that are clearly big time players and will receive offers from the top programs in the country. These players get the most coverage from Rivals et al because there model is built around subscriptions which are more lucrative in the big successful programs.

After that there are 300 who are there and do not get the same level of coverage and you really have to do your homework. There are kids that for whatever reason show up on the radar in their senior seasons. Kids that have academic issues.

What I am getting out is we put a lot of credit in these rankings because it helps us measure a class when in reality these rankings are often being built off of trying to increase subscriptions.

TCU has built an excellent program off of 2-star players from small schools that no one heard of and moving big fast running backs to defensive tackle. TCU put a huge premium on speed. If there is one area that the Dodge regime hurt us more than anything else it was he left us as a VERY slow program, even by Belt standards.

The most interesting thing I have seen about Mac's philosophy is we are more focused in Louisiana than I can ever recall. It will be interesting to see how the Louisiana recruits fare, we have 4 in the 2012 class and at the rate Gaines is handing out offers we may have more in 2013.

[UNTLifer]

Speaking of recruiting other states, I would like to see us establish a presence in Oklahoma as well. We have had success there in the past.

[buff64]

Speaking of recruiting other states, I would like to see us establish a presence in Oklahoma as well. We have had success there in the past.

Ok. State only signed 3 recruits from Ok. this year.

[GrandGreen]

Until just recently La. Tech was beating us consistently on key recruits. So in that respect it is a good development but I agree we still have a ways to go. This year we should see some dividends from Mac. My philosophy is this, in Texas there are probably 50-75 guys that are clearly big time players and will receive offers from the top programs in the country. These players get the most coverage from Rivals et al because there model is built around subscriptions which are more lucrative in the big successful programs.

After that there are 300 who are there and do not get the same level of coverage and you really have to do your homework. There are kids that for whatever reason show up on the radar in their senior seasons. Kids that have academic issues.

What I am getting out is we put a lot of credit in these rankings because it helps us measure a class when in reality these rankings are often being built off of trying to increase subscriptions.

TCU has built an excellent program off of 2-star players from small schools that no one heard of and moving big fast running backs to defensive tackle. TCU put a huge premium on speed. If there is one area that the Dodge regime hurt us more than anything else it was he left us as a VERY slow program, even by Belt standards.

The most interesting thing I have seen about Mac's philosophy is we are more focused in Louisiana than I can ever recall. It will be interesting to see how the Louisiana recruits fare, we have 4 in the 2012 class and at the rate Gaines is handing out offers we may have more in 2013.

Agree that there about 75 to 100 football players that most have identified as major college prospects and they seldom drop to the non-power conference level. But after that there are another 75 to 100 that are borderline major prospects and this is a group that NT is not getting many from. There are another 100 to 200 that will get a fb division ships that are largely fought over by the Belt and CUSA teams. NT has got to start getting the upper level of the third group and a few from the second to move up.

See a lot of references to TCU as a model, but the facts are that they have always been at the upper level of the non-major conference teams and while their recruiting on paper has not been Big 12 level; they have consistently been above the rest of the Texas teams. They are a good team for NT to emulate as stated because they have excelled at finding those second level players that can play.

I don't agree with your ratings per subscriptions view. The results are the same but they rate recruits by who recruits them. The better the team's rating wise, the higher they value the players they are going after. Another factor is I beleive they tend to be more kind to recruits that sign with teams which have team sites on their networks.

[Mean Green 93-98]

Another factor is I beleive they tend to be more kind to recruits that sign with teams which have team sites on their networks.

So who here is going to restart a North Texas Rivals site?

[GrayEagle]

Until just recently La. Tech was beating us consistently on key recruits. So in that respect it is a good development but I agree we still have a ways to go. This year we should see some dividends from Mac. My philosophy is this, in Texas there are probably 50-75 guys that are clearly big time players and will receive offers from the top programs in the country. These players get the most coverage from Rivals et al because there model is built around subscriptions which are more lucrative in the big successful programs.

After that there are 300 who are there and do not get the same level of coverage and you really have to do your homework. There are kids that for whatever reason show up on the radar in their senior seasons. Kids that have academic issues.

What I am getting out is we put a lot of credit in these rankings because it helps us measure a class when in reality these rankings are often being built off of trying to increase subscriptions.

TCU has built an excellent program off of 2-star players from small schools that no one heard of and moving big fast running backs to defensive tackle. TCU put a huge premium on speed. If there is one area that the Dodge regime hurt us more than anything else it was he left us as a VERY slow program, even by Belt standards.

The most interesting thing I have seen about Mac's philosophy is we are more focused in Louisiana than I can ever recall. It will be interesting to see how the Louisiana recruits fare, we have 4 in the 2012 class and at the rate Gaines is handing out offers we may have more in 2013.

Grand's right on all accounts. So far this year on Rivals, they have selected 172 three-star players. Texas universities have 65 commitments (of which we have none); 46 are going out of state. That leaves 61 uncommitted and we are in the running on some. Rivals, Scout and 247 do not agree on all of the recruit's ratings but in most cases they have identified the players.

TCU hasn't been taking 2* athletes to any extent since 2008. The last four years they have signed 79 three-star athletes to 6 two-star and four of those six were in 2009. So far this year all of their commitments are 3* players. Sure there are some gems in the 2* category but it doesn't bode well when your first commitments are those flying under the radar. I trust that this coaching staff can make 3* players out of many of them but what could they do if they started with elite players? My contention is that the 2* players likely will still be there after this season ends and there could be better players who are late developers that have to be passed on because our quota is full.

Louisiana has some good players and Gaines seems to be very good at spotting talent but Texas is still the #1 recruiting area in the nation. Furthermore, this year the new Tulane coach is giving us (and La Tech) far more competition than we've had recently.

I'm not trying to be overly critical of our recruiting but 3* recruits should sell more tickets than the unknowns. Sales is mostly about perception.

Edited June 24, 2012 by GrayEagle