Is Texas recruiting over-rated for NU?

[kchusker_chris]

I agree with you Sker in that there is no way our coaches are leaving Texas when it comes to recruiting. Pieces of our staff were built around that specific plan (Beck's ties to Texas). And I do not have any problem with our coaches being in Texas. I trust em like you. I just think they could abandon Texas (hypothetically) and still pull in 25 players from other states that would make up a top 10 team. Not JUCOs and scraps.

Here are some numbers that do worry me a little bit assuming our coaches put all their eggs in the Texas basket and we end up Big 10. I didn't realize it was this skewed.

10 - The number of 2010 Texas recruits that signed with Big 10 schools. 4 of the 10 were only 2 stars, 6 - 3 stars.

145 - The number that signed with Big 12 schools. 1 - 5 star and a boatload of 4 star players.

15 - The number that signed with an SEC schools. 1 - 5 star and 5 - 4 stars.

14 - The number that signed with Pac 10 schools. 1 - 5 star and 2 - 4 stars.

(at least there's some relief in knowing that more than half the teams in D1 have been able to field teams without Texas recruits though)

I think our history in the region, and location in relation to the Big 12 and Texas would help us. But, if we end up Big 10 and still think we can grab 5 guys a year from Texas it will be tough. However, I do think that a few of those 5 guys whom are generally speaking 2nd tier tallent as far as Texas goes - could be replaced with 1st tier Big 10 recruits we don't have a chance at today. It would be interesting to say the least - I think we could grab a few highly regarded Texas recruits with aspirations to be a part of Big 10 accademics and Nebraska football, without "technically" leaving Big 12 teritory.

 

[RockyMountainOySker]

I agree with you Sker in that there is no way our coaches are leaving Texas when it comes to recruiting. Pieces of our staff were built around that specific plan (Beck's ties to Texas). And I do not have any problem with our coaches being in Texas. I trust em like you. I just think they could abandon Texas (hypothetically) and still pull in 25 players from other states that would make up a top 10 team. Not JUCOs and scraps.

Here are some numbers that do worry me a little bit assuming our coaches put all their eggs in the Texas basket and we end up Big 10. I didn't realize it was this skewed.

10 - The number of 2010 Texas recruits that signed with Big 10 schools. 4 of the 10 were only 2 stars, 6 - 3 stars.

145 - The number that signed with Big 12 schools. 1 - 5 star and a boatload of 4 star players.

15 - The number that signed with an SEC schools. 1 - 5 star and 5 - 4 stars.

14 - The number that signed with Pac 10 schools. 1 - 5 star and 2 - 4 stars.

(at least there's some relief in knowing that more than half the teams in D1 have been able to field teams without Texas recruits though)

I think our history in the region, and location in relation to the Big 12 and Texas would help us. But, if we end up Big 10 and still think we can grab 5 guys a year from Texas it will be tough. However, I do think that a few of those 5 guys whom are generally speaking 2nd tier tallent as far as Texas goes - could be replaced with 1st tier Big 10 recruits we don't have a chance at today. It would be interesting to say the least - I think we could grab a few highly regarded Texas recruits with aspirations to be a part of Big 10 accademics and Nebraska football, without "technically" leaving Big 12 teritory.

I definitely agree that we'll still be able to recruit Texas if we go to the Big12....didn't know that was the point to the discussion. If it is, we are on the same page.

My half of D1 not being able to field teams is obviously an exaggeration.....still though....the number you mentioned mean 170 kids wouldn't be in the Big 12 or Big 10 alone. Add in the rest that go the Pac10 and teams like TCU, Utah, etc....that is a TON of kids. Why would you not want to recruit a state that puts 300+ on D1 teams in 1 year?

 

[RockyMountainOySker]

no one is saying you NEED to recruit there, but it is not overrated.

I will say you NEED to recruit there. You could also choose not to and only recruit Cali, Florida, Missouri, Kansas, and Nebraska.....but that makes about as much sense as combining your bed and toilet.

Of course, you also stated: "Without the state of Texas, half the teams in D1 couldn't field a team." You also wrote: "Texas is probably the most important state to Nebraska football." Really? You are placing way too much importance on the state of Texas. DeMorrio Williams, Greg Austin, and Terrence Nunn are the only Huskers from Texas that have received all-conference recognition from players recruited since 2002. While you state that we didn't focus on Texas recruiting during this time period, we averaged more than 3 Texas recruits per year from 2002-2007.

Look at the numbers from my post above. I really would like to hear your case for why Texas recruiting is more important than instate recruiting. Sure, we have had a recruiting victory or two in Texas over the past couple of recruiting cycles, but most of the time we are left to pick through the scraps left over by Texas, Oklahoma, LSU, and Texas A&M. In Nebraska and some of the surrounding areas, we are the 1st choice. Now I hope that players like Thad Randle, Andrew Green, and Harvey Jackson prove me wrong. But right now, everyone who is so high on Texas is basing this on hope for the future, not results.

How many other All-Conference kids did we have since 2002? Not very many. Again, the question shouldn't be is Texas recruiting overrated...it should be why aren't we getting the right guys out of Texas?

Of the three Texas recruits a year we averaged from 2002-2007, 1 if I'm mistaken was rated 4 stars...Q Castille. IMO, he was worth every star.

The question in this thread is "Is recruiting Texas overrated?" With 1 - 4 star, how can that be overrated?

I've got to go back and look at your "numbers" post....I'll comment on it.

Just scholarship players from the state of Nebraska during the same time period with all-conference recognition:

Jay Moore

Matt Herian

Kurt Mann

Dane Todd

Andrew Shanle

Tierre Green

Bo Ruud

Cortney Grixby

Ty Steinkuhler

Zach Potter

Ricky Henry

Jared Crick

Niles Paul

I disagree with Castille. In two seasons, he rushed for 852 yards with 4.5 ypc. I didn't think David Horne from Omaha lived up to his 4 stars either, and in two seasons he rushed for 1,152 yards with 4.7 ypc.

Perhaps over-rated is not the correct terminology. It is just that our recent recruits from Texas have yet to make much of an impact.

Looking at the 2007 class, we have the following:

Amukumara - AZ - 1st team all-conference

Asante - VA - 1st team all-conference

Crick - NE = 1st team all-conference

Hagg - AZ - honorable mention all-conference

Helu - CA - 2nd team all-conference

Jones - AZ - starter

Lee - CA - starter

Murillo - NM - starter

Paul - NE - honorable mention all-conference

While 25% of our 2007 class was from the state of Texas, these are the players that have contributed:

Blue - 2 career starts

Castille - stats mentioned above

Gilleylen - 2 career starts

Kunalic - kick-off specialist

Shouldn't we expect more production out of 25% of our class?

Not when Bill Callahan is at the helm or picking who we are recruiting. Your 100% that out of Bo's classes, the Texas guys haven't done a ton outside of Rec Burkhead....but neither has any other kid in his classes either b/c they're redshirt sophomores.

 

[kchusker_chris]

There is no reason Bo would say to his staff "we shouldn't recruit the state with the highest concentration of quality talent and spread ourselves out." That makes absolutely no sense.

NO ONE is saying that we should draw a line around Texas and avoid it all together.

As for spreading ourselves out...have you seen Nexus's map? There's balloons all over the thing.

If your talking concentation then w/ the big 3 it's probably Florida at 1 4* or above recruit per 1289 square miles. California (1 in 2557). Texas (1 in 4974)

I don't feel like going through all the states, but I would say Georgia, Alabama, and Louisiana probably also top Texas as far as concentration of talent goes.

 

[RockyMountainOySker]

There is no reason Bo would say to his staff "we shouldn't recruit the state with the highest concentration of quality talent and spread ourselves out." That makes absolutely no sense.

NO ONE is saying that we should draw a line around Texas and avoid it all together.

As for spreading ourselves out...have you seen Nexus's map? There's balloons all over the thing.

If your talking concentation then w/ the big 3 it's probably Florida at 1 4* or above recruit per 1289 square miles. California (1 in 2557). Texas (1 in 4974)

I don't feel like going through all the states, but I would say Georgia, Alabama, and Louisiana probably also top Texas as far as concentration of talent goes.

We've always recruited nationally. This is nothing new. People are saying exactly that we'd be fine if we "draw a line around Texas and not recruit it." I am disagreeing. I want Bo and Co to put as much emphasis on the state that fields the entire team at Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma (most of any state), OSU (most of any state), Missouri (most out of any state), Kansas (most out of any state), and more.

As you posted, just in the Big12 - 145 kids signed from Texas in just 1 year. Texas, Florida, and California are in a different league when it comes to producing talent and not emphasizing any of these three states is stupid.

Edit:Replace my "shouldn't recruit the state" comments and replace them with "it's not important"........says the same thing.

 

[RockyMountainOySker]

:thumbs This has been a fun discussion but there is no way possible to make me believe recruiting Texas isn't important or overrated. :cheers

 

[kchusker_chris]

:thumbs This has been a fun discussion but there is no way possible to make me believe recruiting Texas isn't important or overrated. :cheers

Agree, very good topic for discussion. Might become VERY interesting over the next 6-12 months as conferences look to re-align.

One thing to consider though, is that Texas is important to us because our coaching staff has made it important. That's where we've chosen to recruit. If they decided to recruit Ohio/Michigan/Illini more heavily and place less emphasis on Texas then the "importance" of Texas to NU football would be drastically reduced. If Beck leaves and ends up replaced by someone with excellent connections in Florida, I could see us being less active in Texas. No one here would complain about getting a few more FL recruits each year. Which means Texas might be important today, but only because we've made it that way. It's recruiting grounds can be replaced. So "Texas recruits" from NU's perspective today are important - but in broad, general terms and looking at it from ALL D1 schools, it's not that important.

 

[AndyDufresne]

:thumbs This has been a fun discussion but there is no way possible to make me believe recruiting Texas isn't important or overrated. :cheers

Agree, very good topic for discussion. Might become VERY interesting over the next 6-12 months as conferences look to re-align.

One thing to consider though, is that Texas is important to us because our coaching staff has made it important. That's where we've chosen to recruit. If they decided to recruit Ohio/Michigan/Illini more heavily and place less emphasis on Texas then the "importance" of Texas to NU football would be drastically reduced. If Beck leaves and ends up replaced by someone with excellent connections in Florida, I could see us being less active in Texas. No one here would complain about getting a few more FL recruits each year. Which means Texas might be important today, but only because we've made it that way. It's recruiting grounds can be replaced. So "Texas recruits" from NU's perspective today are important - but in broad, general terms and looking at it from ALL D1 schools, it's not that important.

Good post and I've also had fun with this topic.

I want to clarify my position that I think that we should focus our limited resources on the best players that we have the best chance to sign. Whether they are from Texas or Rhode Island doesn't matter to me.

My posts have merely been the facts, and the facts support the TC's original post up to this point in time. As many have pointed out, we won't be able to evaluate our current staff's Texas recruiting (or recruiting in general) for a couple of years.

 

[RockyMountainOySker]

:thumbs This has been a fun discussion but there is no way possible to make me believe recruiting Texas isn't important or overrated. :cheers

Agree, very good topic for discussion. Might become VERY interesting over the next 6-12 months as conferences look to re-align.

One thing to consider though, is that Texas is important to us because our coaching staff has made it important. That's where we've chosen to recruit. If they decided to recruit Ohio/Michigan/Illini more heavily and place less emphasis on Texas then the "importance" of Texas to NU football would be drastically reduced. If Beck leaves and ends up replaced by someone with excellent connections in Florida, I could see us being less active in Texas. No one here would complain about getting a few more FL recruits each year. Which means Texas might be important today, but only because we've made it that way. It's recruiting grounds can be replaced. So "Texas recruits" from NU's perspective today are important - but in broad, general terms and looking at it from ALL D1 schools, it's not that important.

Good post and I've also had fun with this topic.

I want to clarify my position that I think that we should focus our limited resources on the best players that we have the best chance to sign. Whether they are from Texas or Rhode Island doesn't matter to me.

My posts have merely been the facts, and the facts support the TC's original post up to this point in time. As many have pointed out, we won't be able to evaluate our current staff's Texas recruiting (or recruiting in general) for a couple of years.

KC, you contradicted your entire stance with this comment. A few posts ago you said 145 kids signed from Texas in the Big12 just in the 2010 class. The total number to sign out of Texas is over 300. That number alone, says in broad general terms it is VERY important to recruit Texas.

Andy, the facts that you posted only say that over the last few years the correlation of Texas recruits at Nebraska to all conference honors is low.....that is TRUE. But if you look at all schools and the correlation of Texas recruits to all conference honors, you get an entirely different scenario.

I still say it falls with the kids Bill Callahan brought from Texas to Nebraska as the reason for our low all conference correlation. NONE of these kids were very highly rated....only 1 4 star. We disagree on the quality of that four star but I say he was well worth the four stars. Castille only had 800 or so yards in 2 years b/c we had 900 RBs. If Castille would have been around last year, he would have helped us greatly. I bet we wouldn't have lost to Iowa State and possibly Va Tech.

 

[Husker454]

:thumbs This has been a fun discussion but there is no way possible to make me believe recruiting Texas isn't important or overrated. :cheers

Agreed… a great conversation. I’m still not sure if I am convinced one way or the other. My original intent was actually just to ask the question to start a conversation. I guess I have been frustrated with the whole “Big 10 = no Texas recruits” conversation, which probably proved a catalyst for my O.P. and I haven’t minded playing the devil’s advocate to get the conversation moving. In truth, I was as shocked as anyone when I first discovered that we don’t have a starter from Texas on the roster and I felt like it would spurn a number of reactions from people on the board.

It is kind of funny how passionate people get when you “mess with Texas”.

There are a number of red-shirt sophomores/true Juniors starting for NU including Dennard (GA), Fisher (NE), Compton (MO), Smith (LA), so you can’t say young kids, when talented enough, can’t break the starting rotation over seniors. I also see less heralded kids from states like North Dakota (Qvale), impressing the coaches over analyst favorites like Ash, Coffey, and Thompson. Maybe the Texas kids aren’t over-rated, but sometimes it does seem like kids from small states (especially the Midwest) are under-rated by comparison.

 

[kchusker_chris]

:thumbs This has been a fun discussion but there is no way possible to make me believe recruiting Texas isn't important or overrated. :cheers

Agree, very good topic for discussion. Might become VERY interesting over the next 6-12 months as conferences look to re-align.

One thing to consider though, is that Texas is important to us because our coaching staff has made it important. That's where we've chosen to recruit. If they decided to recruit Ohio/Michigan/Illini more heavily and place less emphasis on Texas then the "importance" of Texas to NU football would be drastically reduced. If Beck leaves and ends up replaced by someone with excellent connections in Florida, I could see us being less active in Texas. No one here would complain about getting a few more FL recruits each year. Which means Texas might be important today, but only because we've made it that way. It's recruiting grounds can be replaced. So "Texas recruits" from NU's perspective today are important - but in broad, general terms and looking at it from ALL D1 schools, it's not that important.

Good post and I've also had fun with this topic.

I want to clarify my position that I think that we should focus our limited resources on the best players that we have the best chance to sign. Whether they are from Texas or Rhode Island doesn't matter to me.

My posts have merely been the facts, and the facts support the TC's original post up to this point in time. As many have pointed out, we won't be able to evaluate our current staff's Texas recruiting (or recruiting in general) for a couple of years.

KC, you contradicted your entire stance with this comment. A few posts ago you said 145 kids signed from Texas in the Big12 just in the 2010 class. The total number to sign out of Texas is over 300. That number alone, says in broad general terms it is VERY important to recruit Texas.

Andy, the facts that you posted only say that over the last few years the correlation of Texas recruits at Nebraska to all conference honors is low.....that is TRUE. But if you look at all schools and the correlation of Texas recruits to all conference honors, you get an entirely different scenario.

I still say it falls with the kids Bill Callahan brought from Texas to Nebraska as the reason for our low all conference correlation. NONE of these kids were very highly rated....only 1 4 star. We disagree on the quality of that four star but I say he was well worth the four stars. Castille only had 800 or so yards in 2 years b/c we had 900 RBs. If Castille would have been around last year, he would have helped us greatly. I bet we wouldn't have lost to Iowa State and possibly Va Tech.

I'm not sure if I contradicted myself or not. I didn't meant it that way if I did. 145 to the Big 12 yes. But, 73 of those went to Baylor, Texas, Texas A&M and Texas Tech. Texas recruits are VERY important to Texas schools. No one can debate that. 17 to OK (very important to them as well) But only 35 went to schools in the North, and 17 of those were to Kansas/MU. In the 3 other big conferences only 34 total - out of 33 schools. It's not that important to the general D1 school unless they make it important. Could those Pac10, Big10, and SEC schools have found someone to fill that 1 scholarship? Absolutely. We've chosen to make it more important than most schools. It's not that we are forced into it because there isn't talent elsewhere, it's a choice we've made.

291, 3 star and above recruits signed from Texas. at least 109 of those stayed in Texas. Thats out of a total pool of thousands around the nation. I just don't see Texas and the abosolute vital lifeline for recruiting that you see it. Pull the plug and NU football would be fine. We aren't surviving on Texas talent. Not yet anyway - we'll see where Pelini takes us.

I agree w/ Castille. Definately would have won the Iowa St. game - Texas game might have been a different story as well. He gav

 

[Danimal]

Of course recruiting Texas is important and should continue no matter what. But some folks act like we'd be screwed if we weren't in the 12 and that is a bunch of crap. Our increased presence is the Big10 states and the nation in-general(better tv-coverage) would make-up for whatever we might lose in Texas.