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For dozens of Division I football programs around the country, a top-30 recruiting class is cause for celebration.
Take Kansas, a Big 12 school that has never even cracked the top 40, according to 247Sports composite rankings. West Virginia has not pulled in a top-30 class since 2010. Kansas State has gone 13 years without one.
RELATED: Longhorns add 3-star receiver
Texas enduring some similar stretch of recruiting futility is incomprehensible.
According to the 247Sports database, the Longhorns had hauled in a top-20 recruiting class every year since 1999.
That streak stopped on Feb. 1.
Coach Tom Herman’s first recruiting class, ranked 26th in the nation, failed to meet most Longhorns’ terribly high standards.
He knows that, which may be why he is hedging against the potential for failure by this transitional class.
“We knew through all the metrics, all the analytics, all the numbers that point to most of the time in years of transition in coaching staffs, that signing class has the highest rate of attrition – meaning kids that quit – has the highest rate of off-field issues including academics, drugs and social, and has the highest rate of guys that can’t play, and don’t ever see the field,” Herman said recently on the Longhorn Network.
He added, “I even went back to check, and when we took over at Ohio State in 2012, we signed 19 guys, and it was considered the fifth-ranked recruiting class in the country, and I went back five years later and looking back at it, there were only three of those 19 that saw significant playing time for us at Ohio State.”
When Herman took over Houston in 2015, his highest-rated recruit was Tyreik Gray, a 3-star running back ranked No. 402 in the nation.
One year later Herman’s star was Ed Oliver, No. 6 in the nation and No. 2 in Texas. The signing of Oliver coupled with three other four-star prospects boosted Houston’s class to No. 36, a remarkable turnaround.
Herman views a similar improvement at his new gig as necessary, albeit not simple.
Even with Texas’ vast resources and blue-blood status, recruiting will still be a cage fight against the nation’s other powerhouse programs.
RELATED: Check out where San Antonio’s top recruits landed on signing day
“We can’t go pick guys anymore,” Herman said. “We have to fight, scratch, claw, battle with teams. Is it going to be that way forever? No. We’re Texas. We’ll always be Texas. We’re going to be back to where it was.”
After three straight losing seasons, Texas can hardly wait.
nmoyle@express-news.net
Twitter: @NRmoyle
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