Chris Monter’s Gophers Football Recruiting Nuggets & Tid-Bits

Five of the six Gopher football commits will open their senior season this weekend.

Andrew Stelter, a 2014 defensive end from Owatonna (MN) High, led the Huskies to a 12-1 mark last year, losing in the 5A Prep Bowl title game to Totino-Grace 49-21.Owatonna opens the season at home versus Rochester Mayo.  

Defensive tackle Steven Richardson helped lead Mt. Carmel to the Illinois High School Association 8A state champions last year. They open the season Saturday at Soldier Field at 9:30 AM versus St. Patrick’s.

Jeff Jones will lead the Minneapolis Washburn Millers face St. Paul Highland Park Friday. He rushed for over 1,000 yards last season and is expected to get even more carries this year with the transfer of fellow 1,000 rusher Raymonte Maynard to Chanhassen.  

Wyandotte’s athletic quarterback Dimonic McKinzy will face Independence Van Horn September 6^th.

Connor Mayes, the younger brother of freshman Alex Mayes, will lead Van Alstyne versus Holliday Friday.

Galen Elmore had two forced fumbles and a fumble recovery as a defensive end and had one catch for 34 yards as a tight end as he helped lead the Spartans to a season-opening 22-14 win over Bloomer. They face GET on the road Friday.

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Despite the strong start to the Gopher’s recruiting season, they rank last in commitments in the Big Ten as the other eleven have gotten off to a great start on the recruiting trails. The eleven teams have a combined 138 commitments. Northwestern, which normally wait until later in the year for its commitments due to its high academic standards, is tied for the fourth most in the conference with 13 along with Illinois and Iowa. Ohio State leads the way with 17 commitments with rival Michigan having 16 and Michigan State adding 14. Penn State has 12 verbals after losing a player. Wisconsin and Nebraska have 11 each, Indiana has 10 and Purdue has eight.

 

Future Big Ten teams are doing their best to “Keep up with the Jones” as Rutgers has an amazing 23 commitment to date and Maryland has nine.

 

Eleven players from Scout’s Top 100 have committed to Big Ten schools. Ohio State has seven commits among the top 100, the most of any school. Michigan has three and Minnesota has the other top 100 commit.

 

Ohio State’s recruiting class is ranked sixth in the country by Scout. Michigan is 12^th and Michigan State is 25^th. Rutgers is ranked 19^th.

 

Ohio State’s recruiting class is ranked fifth in the country by Rivals. Michigan is 15^th and Michigan State is 30^th. Rutgers is ranked 17^th.

ESPN has Michigan’s class as the top in the big Ten as they are ranked sixth. Ohio State is ranked 11^th in the country. Penn State is third in the Big Ten, according to ESPN and is 22^nd. Rutgers is ranked 19^th.

 

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The 14-team SEC has a remarkable 242 commitments to date and has four teams in Scout’s top ten and eight in the top 18.

 

South Carolina is the only team in the SEC to have less than 14 commitments as they have 12. Missouri, which has 20 commitments, is last in the SEC, according to Scout and 39^th overall. However, they would be 7^th, if they were in the Big Ten.

 

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The beginning of next month indicates a change in the recruitment of players from the class of 2015.

The fall evaluation period begins September 1. Not exceeding a period of 42 evaluation days (54 for U.S. service academies) during the months of September, October and November selected at the discretion of the institution and designated in writing in the office of the director of athletics; authorized off-campus recruiters shall not visit a prospective student-athlete’s educational institution on more than one calendar day during this period. All other dates shall be considered a quiet period.

The NCAA also says that September 1 is the first day institutions can send written scholarship offers to high school juniors. Prior to this date, football prospects can only receive written correspondence in the form of a camp brochure and/or a questionnaire.

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The Gophers figure to be one of the youngest team in the Big Ten this season. They have just one senior (Ed Olson) among their two-deep on the offensive line. The only other seniors on the two-deep on the offensive side are fullback Mike Henry and wide receiver Derrick Engel.  

The defensive side has just seven seniors among the 24 players listed in the two-deep.

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Getting top recruits is always important when trying to build a team. However, looking at the Sporting News’ preseason All-Big Ten offensive team, you can see that recruiting is not an exact science. Lineman Spencer Long of Nebraska and wide receiver Jared Abbrederis were walk-ons who were not given star status out of high school by Scout.com. Running back Venric Mark of Northwestern was a two-star wide receiver out of Texas. Lineman John Urschel of Penn State was also a two-star recruit.  

Running back Ameer Abdullah and lineman Jeremiah Sirles of Nebraska and Penn State duo tight end Kyle Carter and Allen Robinson were all three-star recruits.

Taylor Lewan of Michigan, who had early Minnesota interest was a four-star recruit, while Ohio State players, quarterback Braxton Miller and lineman Andrew Norwell, were five-star recruits.  

Heisman candidate Taylor Martinez of Nebraska was a three-star recruit.

The Sporting News’ preseason All-Big Ten defensive team had four former two-star recruits in defensive end Tyler Scott of Northwestern, linebacker Chris Borland from Wisconsin, linebacker Anthony Hitchens of Iowa and Michigan State’s Derqueze Dennard, who was a two-star wide receiver before moving to cornerback by the Spartans.  

The three-star recruits were defensive end Deion Barnes of Penn State, cornerback Bradley Roby from Ohio State and safety Ibraheim Campbell of Northwestern, who was a running back in high school.

Four star recruits were defensive tackles Beau Allen from Wisconsin via Minnetonka and Ra’Shade Hageman of Minnesota and linebacker Ryan Shazier from Ohio State.