First off, we believe this is the best recruiting job Bubba Schweigert and his staff have done since their arrival in Grand Forks back in January, 2014. It’s their third class of recruits and in our opinion, the deepest.
That’s saying something given the success of last year’s class, which so far has shown huge promise and upside. Of course as always, we won’t really know the results until at least three years from now.
Getting early commitments was the key to this class. UND had 13 commitments by the time the season ended in late November (should have been later November but we digress). That meant they only needed to get about 12 more commitments over the next four recruiting weekends.
A common theme we have heard is the staff wants length and athleticism. Body types are a big part of the equation, especially on defense at the OLB and DB positions. The staff knew they needed to get longer to defend against the extremely talented wide receivers they were going to face weekly in the Big Sky. Players like Ray Haas (6’4″), Jaxson Turner (6’2″), Jake Geier (6’2″), Jordan Canady (6’2″), Torrey Hunt (6’1″) and Andre Randolph (6’0″) give them more length out there.
Adding two tall, athletic wide receivers was big for this class. Travis Toivonen (6’3″) and Noah Wanzek (6’4″) are both outstanding basketball players with great leaping ability. This is a much needed entity for UND’s offense.
Another obvious recruiting characteristic of this staff is recruiting ‘position flexibility’. They love kids that they can project at multiple positions. If they aren’t sure how to project a player, they have shown they will start them off at the position they feel is toughest to find quality players at.
For example, starting off a kid at corner and if he simply doesn’t have the hips or feel then they can move him back to safety. Or if a player starts at safety and maybe just doesn’t have the speed, then move him down to OLB.
Coach Luke Knauf and the offensive staff did a nice job of addressing the biggest need on the team, which was by far the offensive line. UND locked up six offensive lineman total. They include a nice mix of centers (Nguon), guards (Hunt, Tobin, Russo), and tackles (Helgren and Mortel). Having said that, the staff prefers that all players know at least two positions so those projected positions could change by the week.
The signing of TE/FB Alex Cloyd was a bit of a breakthrough for UND. The reason we say that is because of Cloyd being from Omaha, which has traditionally been an area that SDSU, NDSU and USD do well in. It has been difficult in the past to convince a kid to drive by Vermillion, Brookings, and Fargo and come up to Grand Forks.
ILB transfer Dijon Murray should provide immediate help at inside linebacker. Reviews have been good on him so far and participating in spring ball will be huge.
When a member of the staff was asked which was harder – gaining a high school prospects commitment or keeping it all the way until signing day? He gave a candid answer – keeping it.
The internet has made recruiting a “known” thing these days for anyone who cares to inquire. Blogs like ours publicize who is visiting UND, who committed to UND, etc. Twitter has given football staffs across America instant glimpses into who their rivals are recruiting, if they didn’t already know. Then, come late December and January teams size up their classes and start offering whoever they deem best, with many times that being an already committed player.
Coach Schweigert touched on this yesterday when he stated, “We get a verbal commitment, and we recruit them like they’re not committed. That keeps families with you and keeps prospects interested. It’s a lot of work, but we’re going to continue to do it that way. It’s important to maintain that relationship.”
Schweigert also went on to say, “When young men make commitments, others are going to keep recruiting them”.
UND was right in the middle of that scenario the past month or two. They had 10+ commits receive offers from rival FCS schools, along with an FBS-PWO (Canady) and needed to hang on to all of them. To the UND staff’s credit, they were able to do so in all cases but one (Jeremy Chinn). That is impressive and says a lot about the job they did recruiting those players.
Their diligence on early homework, evaluations and relationship building paid off in spades at the finish line this year.
This is case in point as to why taking too much heed into which other schools have offered certain kids is an overrated criteria. The list of examples is long, but we will mention one specifically – John Santiago. Sure, it’s nice to win recruiting battles against regional and rival schools for a kid that everyone wants, but it certainly shouldn’t be considered the end-all litmus test.
There’s no question that the best evaluation tool for a coach is to see a kid compete in person at summer camps. This has been hit on ad nauseum by the coaching staff in their media interviews and comments over the past couple years. It’s not a coincidence that in this year’s class, 18 of 23 high school signees in this class have attended summer camp at UND.
Another somewhat forgotten aspect of this years recruiting season was the addition of “Full Cost of Attendance” stipends for all players starting in the fall of 2016. The recruits will get a percentage of the $3,400 FCOA stipend that UND is giving next fall to all athletes. If the recruit is on a 50% scholarship they get $1,700 and so on. When asked about the role that FCOA played in recruiting this year, Coach Schweigert has stated that it played a part but was just one part. It was a feather in their cap but not as big of a deal as it would seem.
The High Performance Center was a much bigger deal in recruiting than FCOA was. That facility is making big impressions on prospective recruits. Just imagine what Phase II (locker rooms, meeting rooms, training rooms, weight rooms, etc) would do. The impact of that would be staggering for recruiting and is sorely needed.
Overall, we feel this class has potential to see at least 5-6 kids have their redshirts pulled. Some of that will be based on immediate depth needs at certain positions, but there are a few we feel that flat-out have the talent to do it regardless. A few names of guys that could compete right away next fall based on their ability along with their position are :
- Alex Cloyd – H-Back
- Jordan Canady – Safety
- Jake Geier – Safety
- Travis Toivonen – Wide Receiver
- Nate Nguon – Offensive Line (guard or center)
- Evan Holm/Andre Randolph/Torrey Hunt – Cornerback
***If you want even more insight into our thoughts on this class go to our Blog Q&A that we did yesterday. A ton of great questions and average answers in there. 🙂
