Winning Without Five-Star Recruits

Mavric

Mavric

Yoda
Staff member
Doesn't mention Nebraska but is applicable:

TCU's Gary Patterson is much more interested in winning in November, December and January than he is in February.


His track record is proof. The Horned Frogs have posted four top-5 finishes in the final polls over the past seven years and one other top-15 finish.

Now, go back and find a top-10 signing class TCU has reeled in during that period.

You won't.

In fact, good luck in finding a top-20 signing class.

In the past four classes, the Horned Frogs' highest finish in the recruiting rankings was 37th. Not bad for a team on the cusp of making the inaugural College Football Playoff this past season and a one that's already showing up near the top of all the early preseason polls for 2015.

"I tell people all the time, 'Yeah, we'd love to recruit a four- or five-star player, but we want him to have a two-star mentality or even a walk-on mentality, somebody that's going to keep rolling up his sleeves and not be happy with where he is,'" Patterson said. "Those kids have a chance to be a lot more successful if they approach it that way, and we have a lot better chance to develop them and fit them into our system."

Gary Pinkel and Missouri have followed a similar plan. So have Michigan State and Mark Dantonio. Stanford and Wisconsin have also outperformed their recent recruiting rankings.

And, yes, one of only two FBS teams over the past five years to finish in the top 10 in the final polls all five years, Oregon, hasn't exactly been a recruiting darling. The Ducks' signing class rank over the past four years has averaged 21.5.
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Now lets look at the national championship winners and see where their recruiting rankings were and the number of 5 star players they signed.

 
No team has won the National Championship in almost 20 years without at least two top 10 recruiting classes in the 4 year cycle. Now, winning the conference is a different story. Though even then you want to be in the top 3 in your division to really have much hope of winning the conference.

For us, our 4 year averages to something in the 30 range nationally and 1 in our division. Which is not saying much. Wisconsin recruits to a philosophy that works well for them, but tends to not show well in the rankings. Purdue seems to forget they play football half the time. Illinois is another basketball school, that if they really cared could be good, but they can't get a good head coach. Minnesota has not really made splash in recruiting rankings ever. Northwestern is a private school that as a whole does not give to rips about sports. And then we have Iowa, that's a train wreck.

We are not in the harder division, and half our division foes are more worried about March Madness than the playoffs. What needs to be a concern is if the Big XII gets rules changed, and things are allowed to go divisionless. Just the top 2 teams play in the championship.

 
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