Illinois Football Recruiting Thread

[thunderwear]

I don't follow the football recruiting very closely, but just looking at the Illini's recruiting ranking it looks like we are only ranked ahead of Rutgers in the conference for 2018 by most people/groups that rank classes. I understand the optimism of a lot of the posters here, heck you have to be an optimist in general to still be a fan of the Illini. But what are people really getting excited about? Does Lovie have some kind of pixie dust he will sprinkle over these players to make them better? I want to be excited as much as the next fan but I just don't see it.

People are excited about several things. First and foremost the team is getting much improved talent. Although this is not a great class for the BIG, we haven't been competing in the BIG consistently since I can remember. Recruiting-wise, we compared to a team in the MAC.

Also, it seems, Lovie has guys that will work in his system. This is, from what I gather, what is key about what he has recruited to date. Players that fit the system will play better than their rankings. We have also found some diamonds in the rough last year and there are some people that may surprise us again this year. Overall, the talent is going up and the team will be better in a year that the state of Illinois was light on P5 talent, this is a great class, to me. Plus add some experience with solid guys that can work in the system, with knowledge of the system, we can start to see out of the deep, darkness our program has been in. A lot of players that provide the base for a solid team. Next year, if we can add a few stars, which many people expect, we will be in a solid position moving into 2020 with a solid foundation.

Lovie has been recruiting for less than 2 years. But even moreso, he was new to recruiting as he had spent most of his career in the NFL. We created inroads to important programs and states. To date, Lovie closed several strong Missouri kids and Florida kids, began pipelines to CA and TX. Now that he is making in roads to great programs and with great coaches, we can start to see the program taking shape.

Overall, I think these are all reasons to be optimistic about the direction of the program. Is this the ideal situation? No. We still need experience and depth at most positions. But we didn't have anything close to this when he started. Last year he had a similarly rated class and 11 of the students received honors. If this class can do similar, we will be in a strong position. I like to think that this points to loving being good at coaching up players and so a lower rated class would perform better than a higher-rated class with a lesser coach.

I know nothing about recruiting, but this is my takeaway

 

[Ol Dirty Gamer]

Anyone catch Jacob Copeland’s announcement? He picked Florida over Tennessee and Bama. Mom made a childish scene and stormed off after the announcement. Just goes to show sometimes how little influence a parent can have on a young mans decision.

 

[ILLINIWEK86]

Anyone catch Jacob Copeland’s announcement? He picked Florida over Tennessee and Bama. Mom made a childish scene and stormed off after the announcement. Just goes to show sometimes how little influence a parent can have on a young mans decision.

I was watching when it happened. Honestly, who does that to their child on National Television?

While you're right on your assessment, I think it also shows that parents often make the whole process about themselves instead of really evaluating what their child really wants.

...or maybe Bama was offering her a Mercedes, and now all she's going to get is a Lexus. Haha

 

[blmillini]

I don't follow the football recruiting very closely, but just looking at the Illini's recruiting ranking it looks like we are only ranked ahead of Rutgers in the conference for 2018 by most people/groups that rank classes. I understand the optimism of a lot of the posters here, heck you have to be an optimist in general to still be a fan of the Illini. But what are people really getting excited about? Does Lovie have some kind of pixie dust he will sprinkle over these players to make them better? I want to be excited as much as the next fan but I just don't see it.

As long as you allow rankings to determine your level of excitement, you are going to be disappointed.

 

[BananaShampoo]

When was Merlin announcing? I thought it was supposed to be already?

 

[Kostas]

When was Merlin announcing? I thought it was supposed to be already?

News said 3-5pm CT

Just saw...committed to ASU

 

[TheGMan]

You are not gaining on the rest of the conference with classes ranked 12th or 13th. There is no buzz with Lovie and the program. The excuse of only being there a couple years doesn't fly. Coaches are coming in to programs 2 months ago and pulling in top talent.

Yeah, but pretty much all of those coaches are walking into programs that haven't been nearly as bad as Illinois. It'd be pretty hard to be a power 5 program with a worse recent history than Illinois. This is going to take a long time to do a complete rebuild. Better get used to it.

 

[TheGMan]

News said 3-5pm CT

Just saw...committed to ASU

Damn. Oh well. He was always a very long shot.

 

[BananaShampoo]

News said 3-5pm CT

Just saw...committed to ASU

Expected, but still "Boooooooo."

 

[Deleted member 3875]

Anyone catch Jacob Copeland’s announcement? He picked Florida over Tennessee and Bama. Mom made a childish scene and stormed off after the announcement. Just goes to show sometimes how little influence a parent can have on a young mans decision.

Bama stopped the wire transfer. She be pissed.

 

[uofi09]

Lovie said in his press conference that they are still waiting on 1 player.

Anyone have any idea who they are waiting on?

 

[helppitch]

You are not gaining on the rest of the conference with classes ranked 12th or 13th. There is no buzz with Lovie and the program. The excuse of only being there a couple years doesn't fly. Coaches are coming in to programs 2 months ago and pulling in top talent.

Illinois HS football is not equivalent to a lot of other states where football is king. New coaches who have success recruiting generally are walking into better situations than Illinois has.

 

[BillyBob1]

Mitch McNutt joins Illinois Football as a preferred walk-on

https://twitter.com/IlliniHQ/status/961341966209470467

Watched him in the state championship. To borrow a line from from Ron Turner, “he’s a football player”,

 

[South Farms]

Watched him in the state championship. To borrow a line from from Ron Turner, “he’s a football player”,

I like the cut of his jib

He may very well turn into this class’ version of Fedjelhem . I wish him nothing but the best . It’s a tough way to do it , but if he and Pops can swing tuition for 2 years , he might get rewarded with a scholly

Some of the guys who have gone this route:
Clay Matthews, USC
Brandon Weeden, Oklahoma State
Jordy Nelson, Kansas State
Adam Archuleta, Arizona State
J.J. Watt, Wisconsin
Santana Moss, Miami

Obviously , the road that walk ons travel is littered with guys who never saw a minute of meaningful time . But for the guy who may be slightly undersized , or blossomed his senior year at a small back water high school , a preferred walk on is their only choice if they want to play big time power 5 football .

You just never know .

 

[Neidermeyer]

Watched him in the state championship. To borrow a line from from Ron Turner, “he’s a football player”,

I couldn't agree more!

 

[lexwaldez]

Rankings......

Or W/L record, or athleticism, or competitiveness, or talent, or on-the-field product.

I knew there would be some folks whining about not getting a top rated class. Then you see a comment like this with no context. You guys are part of the reason we're where we are at as far as I'm concerned. We've been among the worst teams in the nation and you seem to think a coach can come in have two recruiting classes and you expect him to go over .500 right away.

Throw shade if you want to, but I for one applaud the job our staff has been doing over the last couple years. JW has a competent staff working their tails off. Knowing they're starting at a disadvantage with bigger, more successful programs they're doing their own scouting. We've got recruits from Cali, Texas, Florida, St. Louis and Illinois. We're opening doors and our youngsters are getting honors and awards for their play.

They've burned the program to the ground and they're building it, painfully the right way knowing full well the piss poor fans would cry and whine when they didn't see bowl games the first two years. I also applaud the kids coming in to our family, working their tails off and paying the dues needed to get us to where we wanna be because it doesn't come from fans that don't show up, it comes from grinding it out in the weight room, getting experience and taking their lumps. I am really liking the team that is taking shape.

 

[the Castle on Daniel]

Illinois HS football is not equivalent to a lot of other states where football is king. New coaches who have success recruiting generally are walking into better situations than Illinois has.

I try not to put a lot of weight on the rankings. I have more confidence in Lovie than I do in probably anyone else who would have taken this job. He's more than qualified (good guy, good coach) and will take the Illini bowling eventually, but it's kind of misleading to blame the state of our program on Illinois HS football. There's enough talent in Illinois to keep Iowa competitive on the gridiron, for example.

 

[Illini_1979]

I am satisfied with this class and that is all that matters (to me).

 

[mhuml32]

We've been among the worst teams in the nation and you seem to think a coach can come in have two recruiting classes and you expect him to go over .500 right away.

It's possible to understand the Lovie is doing fairly good with the program he took over and not having significant expectations of a quick turnaround on the field, while ALSO understanding that there is a strong correlation between recruiting rankings and future on-field success, meaning that Illinois needs to find a way to bring in more talented recruits to start making noise in the B1G West.


Every post I see bashing those caring about the rankings centers around the belief that those people aren't "committed" to the program and/or are part of the problem. I see extreme value from Illinois getting commits from top-ranked recruits. Lovie needs to get more of them to continue improving the on-field product.

 

[MadSeason]

It's possible to understand the Lovie is doing fairly good with the program he took over and not having significant expectations of a quick turnaround on the field, while ALSO understanding that there is a strong correlation between recruiting rankings and future on-field success, meaning that Illinois needs to find a way to bring in more talented recruits to start making noise in the B1G West.


Every post I see bashing those caring about the rankings centers around the belief that those people aren't "committed" to the program and/or are part of the problem. I see extreme value from Illinois getting commits from top-ranked recruits. Lovie needs to get more of them to continue improving the on-field product.

I'm with ya. I think everyone would like to see Illinois in the top 20 recruiting rankings with star studded classes. I think most people realize you have to crawl before you can walk as well.

It probably isn't very realistic to pin the hopes of a rebuilt program on landing a ton of star players. There is going to have to be an element of out evaluating the competition for players. Finding those guys who for whatever reason go overlooked but can play. I certainly understand the eye rolling when we perennially think we have found undervalued talent because we hear it every year.

However based on last years class I think there is some reason for optimism that Lovie and company have an eye for talent and can get us to a competitive level with these guys so that the higher ranked kids start seeing us as a viable option

 

[Jtepn87]

This is the first time we have had back to back top 50 classes since early-mid Zook. Yes being 12 in BIG is not where you want to be, but we are getting better. The ceiling may not be much higher yet but the floor is several stories higher now.

 

[UIGrad03]

It’s easy to forget that 2.5 years ago our doofus head coach was fired a week before the season started in a player abuse scandal.

27 months ago we fired our disgraced AD and then signed a fired MAC coach to a recruiting-killing short term contract. Our interim AD was telling the press “It’s not ideal, but it shouldn’t be a dagger in the heart of the program.”

Just 23 months ago, Whitman took over and hired Lovie Smith to lend some stability and competence to a flaming dumpster fire of a program that was at absolute rock bottom. He inherited a roster full of borderline MAC level talent and terrible class balance.

This isn’t your typical “rebuild.”

 

[Joel Goodson]

It’s easy to forget that 2.5 years ago our doofus head coach was fired a week before the season started in a player abuse scandal.

27 months ago we fired our disgraced AD and then signed a fired MAC coach to a recruiting-killing short term contract. Our interim AD was telling the press “It’s not ideal, but it shouldn’t be a dagger in the heart of the program.”

Just 23 months ago, Whitman took over and hired Lovie Smith to lend some stability and competence to a flaming dumpster fire of a program that was at absolute rock bottom. He inherited a roster full of borderline MAC level talent and terrible class balance.

This isn’t your typical “rebuild.”

This. Excellent post.

 

[Ramrod2010]

This is the first time we have had back to back top 50 classes since early-mid Zook. Yes being 12 in BIG is not where you want to be, but we are getting better. The ceiling may not be much higher yet but the floor is several stories higher now.

Every time I see this I just shake my head in disbelief. Even if you don't hold ranking systems in high esteem it's impossible to deny the correlation between the two.

That said, I'm hopeful that the coaching staff can make this class appear better than 12th when all is said and done.

 

[UIGrad03]

Every time I see this I just shake my head in disbelief. Even if you don't hold ranking systems in high esteem it's impossible to deny the correlation between the two.

That said, I'm hopeful that the coaching staff can make this class appear better than 12th when all is said and done.

Seemed like a pretty reasonable post to me. We had classes ranked around 70 and now under new leadership have bumped that into the top 50. He acknowledged that this isn’t where we want to be, but it’s setting the floor quite a bit higher than previous classes were.

Once again the conference recruiting is top heavy, but after the top teams, there isn’t a ton of quality disparity. For instance, the difference in average quality rankings between #1 OSU (94.2) and #3 Michigan (88.8) is greater than the average quality rating between #4 Nebraska (87.7) and #12 Illinois (83.9).