Sports Illustrated Recruiting Story

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Did anyone read this week's Sports Illustrated and the story about college football recruiting. They showed a map of the US breaking down by state and county the number of kids that signed NLIs to play at a BCS school from 2004-2008 (five classes). If you break it down, it gives a good understanding of what challenges Minnesota faces.

For example, during the five-year period, Los Angeles alone produced between 150 and 320 BCS recruits. That is just Los Angeles and not the rest of California. The entire state of Minnesota produced a maximum of 58 BCS recruits. The map does not give exact numbers, but rather ranges. Anyway, no wonder USC is pretty good each year as long as they lock down their own city. I know they compete against UCLA in recruiting, but outside of the Bruins they really only have to compete in state with Cal.

No surprise that the southeast is littered with a high percentage of BCS recruits. Anyway, if you look at the map, Minnesota really is on the outside of the BCS hotspots when you think about that we have to recruit against all of the Big Ten and Notre Dame in their backyards. We are just not in a populated area for BCS football players
 

Well considering the Los Angeles area has 3.6 million inhabitants, I'd say it's not that surprising that there are that many BCS-caliber recruits there. Remember, MN is only 5.6 million in population. While I agree we simply do not (and probably never will) produce the sheer number of high level recruits, we do have enough talent here to consistently fill nearly half of our yearly scholarships. With a full 4 months of the year being unable to actually play football, and the football season being shorter than southern states, I am not surprised we don't have thousands of high caliber athletes (for the same reason that MN churns out a lot more hockey players than, say, Texas). Also consider that the top 2 or 3 in-state prospects have been ranked fairly high in recent years, we would be doing pretty well for ourselves if we completely locked down the borders. You also point out that USC competes with Cal and UCLA for recruits - we have no other DI FBS school in the state. It has been said here before - we can't compete on a national level with only MN (or WI for that matters) players, but we sure as hell can do well by locking down the borders and then going and getting some talent from hotbeds. If Michigan, Wisconsin, etc. can play on that level so can we.
 

we do have enough talent here to consistently fill nearly half of our yearly scholarships.

No.

If you're talking about the type of players Glen Mason recruited, then yes.

But if you're talking about Brewster, I'd say more like a third. We can't afford to give 12 scholarships a year to MN kids - at least 5 or 6 of them would be taking the spot of a more deserving out-of-state player. And not just OSU rejects or NJ kids that Penn St. didn't recruit - real, live players from football hotbeds.
 

The number of people in a particular state is not that big of an issue. The LSU job is a top job because of the quickness of the population, not the size of the population.
 

No.
We can't afford to give 12 scholarships a year to MN kids - at least 5 or 6 of them would be taking the spot of a more deserving out-of-state player. And not just OSU rejects or NJ kids that Penn St. didn't recruit - real, live players from football hotbeds.

It would be best to try to field a team in which half of the guys are from MN, WI, IA or the Dakotas for several intangible reasons... wheather this is accomplished through industry-standard recruiting or some type of walk-on program and regardless of how many of those guys are starters.

I count 12 D1 prosepects/year. There have always been about 6 high quality scholarship commits that come from Minnesota. Mason typically lost 3 or more to other schools. Then, the system usually overlooked another 3 that easily would have been starters at MN had they been on the D-1 recruiting radar.

I know that last comment may be controversial because there's that whole debate that has gone on for dacades over wheather or not the U was making the most of the talent available locally. But I think it's safe to say: the immediate and overwhelming success of the four new D-1 schools to the West put that issue to rest. Minnesota has been overlooking local football talent. A lot of it. Finding 3-5 more prospects from Minnesota and the Dakotas that could be contribute shouldn't be an issue.
 


If Brewster wants to build a ton of local support for his program, build a season ticket base, etc, mainly in the rural area's of Minnesota he need to have walk on program like they had at the Nebraska under Osborne.

What Osborne did was have literally 100's of recuits from all parts of Nebraska come to each home football game, sometimes entire teams with there coaches. Then what he would do is suggest they all should walk on. Any way he would give general populas of Nebraska mainly those in very rural area's(I don't think that there are any other parts of Nebraska) that he winning with Johnny son of Bob and Darlene and Timmy from the next town over. Which he was but then he would add a bunch of studs from Southern Cal, Texas etc.

If Brewster did this odds are he would find a few diamonds but more than likely a bunch of kids that want to put the helmet on and play even if its special teams. Those kids would have great pride and bust there ass on coverage. Every one would win.
 

I think Brewster is doing fine with recruiting. You are never going to get every good player in your state, so when there is only..lets just say 12 D1 type players in the state, you aren't going to get all of them. You are always going to overlook some kids, thats just how it goes. It is tough to evaluate talent in some places like ND and SD. Name some players we should be landing right now from MN/Dakotahs, and name some players on the current commit list that they should replace.
 

If Brewster wants to build a ton of local support for his program, build a season ticket base, etc, mainly in the rural area's of Minnesota he need to have walk on program like they had at the Nebraska under Osborne.

What Osborne did was have literally 100's of recuits from all parts of Nebraska come to each home football game, sometimes entire teams with there coaches. Then what he would do is suggest they all should walk on. Any way he would give general populas of Nebraska mainly those in very rural area's(I don't think that there are any other parts of Nebraska) that he winning with Johnny son of Bob and Darlene and Timmy from the next town over. Which he was but then he would add a bunch of studs from Southern Cal, Texas etc.

If Brewster did this odds are he would find a few diamonds but more than likely a bunch of kids that want to put the helmet on and play even if its special teams. Those kids would have great pride and bust there ass on coverage. Every one would win.


I agree and feel that at a school like Minnesota a large walk-on program could help develop the program when you do find those late bloomers. Nebraska had 27 former walk ons in Osbornes tenure there make the NFL.
 

I think Brewster is doing pretty well with the walk ons. Rallis for example, as well as Marcus Sherrels (but was he a mason guy?). I like how he offered a spot to Engel and Ngekia so far.
 



It would be best to try to field a team in which half of the guys are from MN, WI, IA or the Dakotas for several intangible reasons...

I couldn't agree more. In an ideal world, that would be the case. But as much as we want, we just can't will more quality HS football players into the upper midwest. If we want to compete with Western Michigan, Ohio, and Toledo, then comprising half our roster of MN players is fine. But if we want to compete for Big Ten titles, we just can't. In an average year, the 12th-best recruit coming out of MN just isn't a starter on a team competing for Big Ten titles. Of course there are the outliers like Floyd, Laurinaitis, Mauer, Barber, Weber, Decker, etc., etc. that come out of this state on an annual basis. And there will be years (like 2010, from the looks of it) where you could take the top 15-20 kids and be just fine. But on a year-in, year-out basis, if we're building the foundation of this team on upper midwest talent, we're in trouble.
 

I couldn't agree more. In an ideal world, that would be the case. But as much as we want, we just can't will more quality HS football players into the upper midwest.

Here's where we disagree: I don't believe you need to "will" it. I think you have to find it and train it. People obsess over losing McNeal and Floyd because there is a name and a face.

What would have to happen for you to belive that Minnesota has not been taking full-advantage of all the local talent we have access to?

A half-dozen unrecruited Upper-Midwesterners ending up in the NFL, FOUR new local D-1 teams having unprecedented success in their first few years, NDSU actually beating Minnesota and Duluth winning the D-2 National Championship- was enough for me.

I think Brewster is doing a good job of recruiting. Over the long term, however, the U is going to have to come up with a way to find, recruit and train more local talent. I'm not sure how to accomplish this. But the consequences of doing nothing on this front will certainly grow be greater than losing an occasional game to NDSU.

Perhaps the 2010 class is the result of the D1 recruiters at the U and the Dakota schools digging deeper into Minnesota HS's than in the past. I suspect that may be the case, because I refuse to belive that rivals and scout aren't more of a reflection of what's already happening than a forecast.
 

I'd be interested to see what the state of Michigan produces. Obviously Michigan is usually good, and hauls down great classes, but Michigan state is a program on the rise and had a great recruiting class coming in. And that's with being the 2nd biggest name in a northern state.
 

The most BT players by far come from Ohio, followed surprisingly by Indiana, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa. I do not know about "out of area" states.
 



It would be best to try to field a team in which half of the guys are from MN, WI, IA or the Dakotas for several intangible reasons... wheather this is accomplished through industry-standard recruiting or some type of walk-on program and regardless of how many of those guys are starters.

I count 12 D1 prosepects/year. There have always been about 6 high quality scholarship commits that come from Minnesota. Mason typically lost 3 or more to other schools. Then, the system usually overlooked another 3 that easily would have been starters at MN had they been on the D-1 recruiting radar.

I know that last comment may be controversial because there's that whole debate that has gone on for dacades over wheather or not the U was making the most of the talent available locally. But I think it's safe to say: the immediate and overwhelming success of the four new D-1 schools to the West put that issue to rest. Minnesota has been overlooking local football talent. A lot of it. Finding 3-5 more prospects from Minnesota and the Dakotas that could be contribute shouldn't be an issue.

You're right that there are more players the could have been starters at Minnesota that end up at NDSU, SDSU, etc. Scouting is imperfect and the problem is identifying the potential starters amongst the many borderline prospects. In any given year there are probably 6-8 players that could be the 3-4 future contributors on the Gophers that are not offered scholarships. However, if you use 8 scholarships to bring in 3-4 scholarship quality players you end up wasting 16-20 scholarships over a four year period and that is about 18%-24% of your scholarships.

The answer to the problem is a strong walk on program that you can get those 8 players and eventually give the correct 4 scholarships. I have no idea why we don't have a walk on legacy like Nebraska does but it's something their coaches figured out a long time ago. Their state has a lot of borderline recruits and if we can get all of the borderline guys on campus with a S&C program and college coaching we'll figure out later which ones are deserving of scholarships.
 

My understanding is that most everything Nebraska once did is not allowed now. For example, the old county scholarships that went to 'worthy members of the community' (ie football players) is not allowed. Today, a so called walk on must have no ride from anywhere.

Plus, you are not allowed to have 300 guys on the team anymore.
 

I know what you are saying Goldy74s but my point was that if you just have the visual that the team is made up of Jimmy, Bob and Darlene's boy and Timmy from the next town over in South Central Minnesota. That would be a huge potenial fan base that I feel isn't being tapped correctly. Basically what I'm suggesting is that Brewster as the entire team over from say Glencoe Silver Lake(could really be any small school in rural Minnesota) for the game against Purdue, for example. Then Brewster has them done on the sideline during the game give the kids a really cool time. Have a tailgate for them all that stuff. If Brewster gets lucky he can might get a few athletes that are willing to walk on and bust there tail for the team. Then you have the marketing department do a advertise the crap out of these kids particully in their home area's.

Everyone wins.
1. Towns win. Remember Jimmy he walked on played on kick off coverage.
2. The kids win. Can you think about the buzz that the football team would have getting to go "THE U" to be recuited. Even if they don't even go to the U it's a great thing.
3. Brewster wins. So next time GSL high school produces the next big thing, Brewster would have a relationship already. Coaches will remember what you do for there kids.
4. Coaches win. Mabybe if the coaches are lucky they might be able to learn something on the sideline to help there team win.

Where is the downside in this?
 

I need to jump back in on my original post and clarify one thing. My primary point was that in Minnesota, we don't have a tremendous recruting base in state for BCS-calibar players and we have to reach out farther than any other Big Ten school to draw them in. We should never recruit against NDSU or SDSU for a kid, other than if we want him to walk-on. There is (should be) a big gap between a Big Ten player and a Division I-AA player, not saying the I-AA player could not walk-on and eventually earn a scholarship at Minnesota.

My USC reference was based on numbers, but I should also add the fact that the quality of player in the LA area is much better. I also saw that LA has around 10 ESPN Top 100 high school players in the country this year and I think eight are going to USC. See...even Pete Carroll doesn't get all the top recruits in his back yard, but he got eight darn good ones.
 

I know what you are saying Goldy74s but my point was that if you just have the visual that the team is made up of Jimmy, Bob and Darlene's boy and Timmy from the next town over in South Central Minnesota. That would be a huge potenial fan base that I feel isn't being tapped correctly. Basically what I'm suggesting is that Brewster as the entire team over from say Glencoe Silver Lake(could really be any small school in rural Minnesota) for the game against Purdue, for example. Then Brewster has them done on the sideline during the game give the kids a really cool time. Have a tailgate for them all that stuff. If Brewster gets lucky he can might get a few athletes that are willing to walk on and bust there tail for the team. Then you have the marketing department do a advertise the crap out of these kids particully in their home area's.

Everyone wins.
1. Towns win. Remember Jimmy he walked on played on kick off coverage.
2. The kids win. Can you think about the buzz that the football team would have getting to go "THE U" to be recuited. Even if they don't even go to the U it's a great thing.
3. Brewster wins. So next time GSL high school produces the next big thing, Brewster would have a relationship already. Coaches will remember what you do for there kids.
4. Coaches win. Mabybe if the coaches are lucky they might be able to learn something on the sideline to help there team win.

Where is the downside in this?
MNBoiler, you're right on the mark here. I have a friend on the Nebraska staff and we spent 20 minutes talking about this when he was here in January. He pretty much brought up your exact points and said that with the players that develop in to players for Nebraska it is worth about 4 scholarships a year. And then there are the obvious side effects of the casual fans in the state embracing the team and building bridges to the HS coaches for future recruiting.
 

Frankly, if the "in state" flavor of college football is going to be maintained there needs to be some rule changes made regarding recruiting. Like the NFL, there needs to be some sort of sliding scale that allows the "have nots" to have more of a chance to maintain some sort of parity without resorting to 'creative recruiting'.
 

Larry, Jr., didn't help Minnesota high school football much yesterday at the Super Bowl...this was from Mark Craig's blog if you did not see it.

"Guys blossome sometimes later than others,” Fitzgerald said. “I’m from Minnesota, and it’s not like it’s a hotbed for football. I wasn’t playing against great talent there. I was playing against mediocre talent. I didn’t work out when I was in high school. I didn’t do anything. I was jusst playing and being with my buddies and having a good time. When I got to college, it was the first time I started working out and lifting and I kind of started filling out. I think I started to become a man, and that’s when I took my next big step.”
 

Larry, Jr., didn't help Minnesota high school football much yesterday at the Super Bowl...this was from Mark Craig's blog if you did not see it.

"Guys blossome sometimes later than others,” Fitzgerald said. “I’m from Minnesota, and it’s not like it’s a hotbed for football. I wasn’t playing against great talent there. I was playing against mediocre talent. I didn’t work out when I was in high school. I didn’t do anything. I was jusst playing and being with my buddies and having a good time. When I got to college, it was the first time I started working out and lifting and I kind of started filling out. I think I started to become a man, and that’s when I took my next big step.”

Lets remember that he was playing WR at a 4A private school that plays in the Missota Conference. Holy Angels had a good couple years when Fitzgerald & Stocco were there but traditionally they are the doormat of the Missota with Benilde. A talented WR can get away with not lifting in HS, especially in the Missota. However, go look at the linemen at Eden Prairie, CDH, Minnetonka, Wayzata, etc and see how hard they are working.
 

Agree with MNBoiler and others...

I have some personal small-town MN experience to back up MNBoiler’s point. I grew up in Detroit Lakes. My brother graduated with a kid named Mike Frankberg. Mike’s a great guy and always been a Gopher fan. He was a good athlete and a pretty good QB. Unfortunately he had the misfortune of playing with an even better athlete a year younger who was the starter. He played WR and DL won a state title when he and my brother were juniors. Our HS FB coach was on good terms with Mason and his staff and suggested to them that Mike would make a good FB manager when he was frosh at the U. The coaches were impressed by Mike's effort, talents, and work ethic. He was offered the chance to walk on as a QB as a junior and got a scholly for his senior year (he thought he was getting cut when Mase called him into his office to offer it). He never made it on the field for a snap but you could tell how much the experience meant to him. It was a huge deal in my hometown and there are still folks in DL who think Mase got a bum deal simply b/c they like him so much for giving Mike a spot on the roster. It also got nice play in the regional press (I tried to find my hometown paper’s account but they don’t keep stories up on the web long...I also couldn’t find the Fargo Forum’s story). But the Daily covered it and I found that link: http://www.mndaily.com/2007/09/20/medical-school-will-wait-backup-qb

I don’t think Mike is exactly illustrative of the point that Boiler and others were making (i.e. use walkon’s to find a few kids who can be good starters) but I think it does a GREAT job of illustrating the positive effect offering MN kids (especially in the out-state) the chance to play for the Gophers has on a community and on the football programs that exist there. DL was a powerhouse in Section 8 and 4A football from 1990 or so through just recently. We never produced a true D-1 prospect during that time (though the 3 Manke brothers were pretty close and all did well at UND). But I think DL had exactly the kind of program that could produce some good walkons.
 

Lets remember that he was playing WR at a 4A private school that plays in the Missota Conference. Holy Angels had a good couple years when Fitzgerald & Stocco were there but traditionally they are the doormat of the Missota with Benilde. A talented WR can get away with not lifting in HS, especially in the Missota. However, go look at the linemen at Eden Prairie, CDH, Minnetonka, Wayzata, etc and see how hard they are working.

True; he didn't play at a school with one of MN's more competetive weightrooms. But I think his point still rings true ... there is definitely a lot of room for improvement in this area.

Even at our elite programs the numbers, when published, are frightening. I'm not going to name any kids here. But it seems safe to say that there needs to be more competition when it comes to training. The facilities are there, and there's more than enough educated fitness professionals.

Every prospective D1 athlete in MN should have the heart and dedication to sustained traing that Sam Maresh has.
 

GoAUpher has it right. My guess is that when Mike was on the team 16 people from Detroit Lakes had seasons tickets first just to see Mike. Now some of the fans feel in love with football at the U say 6 of them still have there season tickets. Think about what would happen if every small school in out-state Minnesota would have a story just like not just for the football team but both men's and women's basketball, hockey, wrestling, volleyball, etc. It would be wonderful. How many potential booster would that be. Literally thousands, if each each would give 100 in general donations each year. We wouldn't have TCF Bank Stadium we would have Memorial Stadium(or your prefered non-corp. name here) the basketball team would have a new practice area, the list could go on. Then the increased demand for ticket, then the U could ask for a donation for more seats and lower the amounts on the high end. It wouldn't just trickle though the athletics department but the entire University.

I also have been doing some thinking about your average high D-1 athlete in Minnesota. The odds are that person would be black. And for what ever reason the black community in the Twin Cities(were it is based) has not connected with the U as most people here. So they wouldn't have that loyality(ironic how a small town kid from southern Minnesota is talking about loyality when he goes to a rival Big Ten school).
 

MNBoiler--I hope you saw my post above agreeing with what you said. If not, go check it out.

The other reason my friend at Nebraska liked the big walk on program was the increased effectiveness of practice. From what he said I will describe the average practice during the season.

1st team O goes against Scout team D to implement the game plan. Meanwhile, 2nd team O watches from the sideline and players that are get PT substitute in for 1st team O.

Ditto for Scout team O vs. 1st team D at the same time.

However, at Nebraska where they still have a large walk on program it runs like this.

1st team O goes against 1st Scout team D to implement the game plan.
Meanwhile, 2nd team O goes against 2nd Scout team D to implement the game plan.

1st Scout team O goes against 1st team D to implement the game plan.
Meanwhile, 2nd Scout team O goes against 2nd team D to implement the game plan.

This requires a little more investment because you need twice the field space to double the size of your practice. It also requires the coaches to be more engaged because they are doubling the work load but part of that is picked up by the Graduate Assistants that have to be more involved and teams generally hire 2 interns (usually coaches that have experience at the HS level but want to move to college, they are GA's in training).

Net results:
1. Better prepared team, particularly the back ups
2. Better player development, particularly the younger players & back ups
3. Improved coaching experience, helps attract better coaches
 

grunkiejr, we are on the same page here. Brewster could only benefit from having a Nebraska-esk walk-on program. Many of the benefits I along with multiple other have covered already. You mentioned earlier that there was a limit of the number of players the team can have actively on its roster.

I looked it up and the max number of active players is 105 it is also worth noting that there is a maxium of 60 non-uniform personal, which would be coaches, trainers, doctors, managers, etc. but I do not know if that includes inactive, red shirt, or grey shirt players. So in theory you can up to 165 people on the sideline. Anyway just because there is a limit of the number of players that doesn't mean that walk-ons couldn't rotate being in uniform and being inactive. With 85 scholarships it is concievable to up to 240 walk-ons and have them all dressed for one game. I know that is an insane number it will never happen.

But you said something very interesting to me about the space needed to have a practice like the Nebraska style and that is the size of the practice area, or more importently in this case the number of practice fields. After some super quick looking(thank you huskers.com, gophersports.com, and Google Maps) I was able to see that Nebraska has 4 full size 120 yard long practice fields. 1 inside and 3 outside. While the Gophers only have about 2 and 1/2. 1 inside and 1.5 outside. Now that is a huge disadvantage for the Gophers. But looking at the maps it would certainly be possible for the Gophers to add more space with some creative thinking and wise land use by the athletics department in the area behind Bierman and around Siebert Field.

I really would like to take the Nebraska walk-on model to work here. It would only benefit the state and the program.
 

Any way to use a club football team to accomplish any of this?
 

grunkiejr, we are on the same page here. Brewster could only benefit from having a Nebraska-esk walk-on program. Many of the benefits I along with multiple other have covered already. You mentioned earlier that there was a limit of the number of players the team can have actively on its roster.

I looked it up and the max number of active players is 105 it is also worth noting that there is a maxium of 60 non-uniform personal, which would be coaches, trainers, doctors, managers, etc. but I do not know if that includes inactive, red shirt, or grey shirt players. So in theory you can up to 165 people on the sideline. Anyway just because there is a limit of the number of players that doesn't mean that walk-ons couldn't rotate being in uniform and being inactive. With 85 scholarships it is concievable to up to 240 walk-ons and have them all dressed for one game. I know that is an insane number it will never happen.

But you said something very interesting to me about the space needed to have a practice like the Nebraska style and that is the size of the practice area, or more importently in this case the number of practice fields. After some super quick looking(thank you huskers.com, gophersports.com, and Google Maps) I was able to see that Nebraska has 4 full size 120 yard long practice fields. 1 inside and 3 outside. While the Gophers only have about 2 and 1/2. 1 inside and 1.5 outside. Now that is a huge disadvantage for the Gophers. But looking at the maps it would certainly be possible for the Gophers to add more space with some creative thinking and wise land use by the athletics department in the area behind Bierman and around Siebert Field.

I really would like to take the Nebraska walk-on model to work here. It would only benefit the state and the program.


I am in total agreement that we should try and implement this model and I don't really see any negatives to it. You will find those diamonds in the rough, Nebraska alone had 27 walk-ons make it to the NFL as well as several all-americans. This year alone they had two walk-ons start every game on defense. Once you get the program rolling and kids see that they have a chance to possibly become a star through hard work and good coaching you will get kids who will be turning down scholarships from the NDSU, SDSU, and Northern Iowa's to walk-on here.
 

MNBoiler--I'm really impressed you looked up the practice facilities for Minnesota and Nebraska. Now that is fan dedication.

Aside from the investment in field space for practices, we would need to make other investments such as additional academic support staff, weight facilities (or do something to stagger weight training times), and I'm sure there are other things I'm not thinking of.

However, the good thing about a walk-on program is that you only take model citizens that have the academic credentials and character that will be a positive reflection on the program. You get hard working blue collar type of players that positively influence the players around them and make everybody work harder.
 

It is kind of funny though. Mason told Nate Swift and Mitch Erickson in Hutchinson he wasn't interested in either. I don't know if he offered walk-on opportunities, but Swift walked on at Nebraska (and earned a scholarship) and Erickson went to one of the South Dakota schools where he was a Little All-American and is now with the Broncos (who cut Eslinger).

I agree that the walk-on program is extremely important. I'd hold at least a couple of scholarships every year to reward walk-ons and a good way to keep Upper Midwest kids in the fold.
 




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