Final Countdown
By Lake The Posts on
As Northwestern preps for a key home game with Purdue, the football program is in close mode for the final few scholarship slots.
WildcatReport.com served up a great piece today on the final weekend of 2012 recruiting and the good spot Northwestern is in. The ‘Cats are enjoying their highest rated recruiting class in the era of rating services. Several recruiting services have Northwestern third in the Big Ten which is unprecedented for not only a Fitz team, but any Northwestern team. There are 20 commitments to date and with a few slots remaining the ‘Cats have zeroed in on five star 2010 WR USC transfer, Kyle Prater, who is visiting this weekend and expected to commit to the Wildcats. Additionally, “athlete”/RB Stephen Buckley from Forney, Texas is on the visit list. The final week always nets some surprises and NU has a good track record of scooping up a last minute gem due to a confluence of circumstances. Last year, we plucked Jordan Perkins from Stanford as he was held in academic purgatory which many felt was a soft way of Stanford pushing him out for a more highly touted RB.
Speculation is running rampant in the sport of Signing Day as four star LB Quanzell Lambert finds himself committed to Rutgers and Greg Schiano is no longer there. Northwestern fans are wishful thinking that perhaps Lambert reconsiders the Wildcats who were in his final list.
The good news is it feels like March around Chicago. It’s a near 50-degree day which never hurts when you’re bringing in a Texan who has the preconceived notion of Evanston in January. The ‘Cats have three four stars – Ifeadi Odenigbo, Greg Kuhar and Adam DiPietro – more than doubling the entire total of the history of four-stars (Patrick Ward, Loren Howard) to commit to NU. When Prater commits it will mark the school’s first ever five star recruit, albeit a circuitous route.
I love this time of year as every commit feels like an injection of optimism for the future. Boy, do we need it. The glow of good news is a little bit of air cover for the massive holes we have to address on the field in 2012, especially on the defensive side of the ball. The secondary is enough to keep you up at night and we’ve got more question marks than answers on both lines. But, that’s for later. This kind of recruiting momentum is what gets me through the doldrums of the winter as it relates to NU football.
The ‘Cats -Purdue game is very close to soldout and will hopefully provide a fun diversion for our potential recruits. I’m somewhat expecting a student section serenade of “Prater, Prater…come here”. I actually witnessed it once in 1986 when then Indiana guard Delray Brooks was visiting Providence and Rick Pitino. A packed Civic Center started yelling “Del-ray…Del-ray” spontaneously and it was one of the coolest things I’d witnessed. He transferred and helped the Friars on their Final Four run in ’87. Ahh, but I digress to childhood memories.
What really has my attention in the recruiting challenges going on at Wisconsin. The Badgers have lost six assistant coaches this off-season and the disruption is clearly impacting recruiting. As of today, Wisconsin has only 11 scholarship slots filled, although, in fairness, I’m uncertain of how many they have available. Nebraska has 13. While quantity doesn’t trump quality, there is a base of players you need each year to build depth. It’s really quite phenomenal what Fitz has done during a poor season on the field and with the promise of new facilities down the road and of course, a stadium that doesn’t hold a candle to other Big Ten teams not named Indiana in terms of fans in the stands.
It should be an interesting week. Buckle up.
What about Odenigbo on our 4-star recruit list?
And…..that’s what you get when you post on no hours of sleep all week. What a mess-up!!!
@LTP
Out of curiosity, which recruiting services have us 3rd in the Big Ten? The only one I see is Scout.com. All of the rest I’ve looked at have us 9th or 10th?
Should’ve modified that to include online college sports entities. The Big Lead (just acquired by Gannett) had us as #3. Will post the others…
Scout ranks us 3rd in the Big Ten, but considering that we’re just barely ahead of a number of Big Ten schools (7 schools within 16 spots of us), I wouldn’t say our talent has jumped that much this year necessarily. Rivals ranks our class #9 in the Big Ten (ESPN seems to think of our class similarly). Looking at the rankings of our recruits at all three sites, this class looks like pretty much every other class in the Fitz era, with Ifeadi as an added bonus.
I meant 7 schools within 16 spots of us nationally (we’re 40th in the country according to Scout, but much of the 40-50s are occupied by Big Ten teams)
With THREE 4-star recruits, NU has risen a level in the recruiting wars. In the past, getting one was considered incredible good luck.
Most of us expect more good news, too.