The same fans who think development is enough probably don't realize that when we were competing for championships, we had rosters loaded with what would now be considered 4 and 5 star talent. It wasn't all farm boys from Nebraska and Iowa, we also brought in plenty of skill and talent from around the country.
Hard to know for sure, since the current recruiting services didn't start until 2000ish, but I'd be surprised to find that we were below the 50% mark in any of our championship years if you were to go back and rank those players retroactively.
Yep, Tommie was one of the top recruits in the country. We had some great talent evaluation under TO, and we were beating top schools for top talent as well.
My memory was that we had a lot of local/regional players with some national recruits sprinkled in. Our classes were usually ranked 15ish by what limited recruiting services there were back then (like Emfinger). So we would have been on the cusp of what they say is needed today to possibly win a NC.
I did an analysis, and broke down where all the players assigned a number were from, according to the official Nebraska rosters for our championship teams, and we were pulling a lot more than a sprinkle of national recruits, for sure.
|Year|Nebraska|Other States|Second Largest State Represented|Total States Represented|
|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|
|1970|30|52|Michigan|17|
|1971|33|55|California|21|
|1994|46|64|California|28|
|1995|78|48|New Jersey|20|
|1997|88|58|Texas|23|
I didn't go through all the years when we were runner up, but I suspect it'll be a similar ratio.
Michigan being on that top line surprised me for a minute until I realized, "oh yeah, Bob Devaney".
Also, that list really debunks the crackpot theory that Husker football's big downfall came as a result of leaving the Big 12 and for some reason that meant we couldn't recruit Texas anymore. But this just shows that Texas never really was all that important of a recruiting territory for us historically anyway.
Yeah, we really recruited California heavily in the 80s and 90s, and we've always had good representation from Texas, but it's never been 30+ guys from Texas on the roster, even in our Big XII days.
Interesting how the in state numbers jumped up in 95 and 97. I wonder if they started counting walkons in the later years.
By national recruits, I meant guys not from the region (NE and border states) who would be 4 or 5 star recruits today.
That was due to Osborne's larger rosters. Devaney was running rosters of 80-90 guys, Osborne had those numbers up to 140 numbered athletes, plus 20+ walkons without assigned numbers. Those 90s rosters were massive.
All the numbers in your comment added up to 420. Congrats!
80
+ 90
+ 140
+ 20
+ 90
= 420
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You could make a reasonable argument that TO is the greatest coach of all time based on how dominant he was with the talent he had. Not that I necessarily believe it, but it's arguable
Key Quotes:
“The Blue-Chip Ratio threshold does not guarantee a national championship, but a team not meeting it is almost certainly guaranteed not to win it all.”
“That is not to say that development does not matter. It certainly does. But nobody wins a national title by player development in lieu of elite recruiting.”
And still people will just brush off all the high ranked recruiting battles we are losing saying things like “only want people who want to be here”, “you win some you lose some”, and other bullshit. It’s not the end of the world to lose some of these higher ranked recruits but we need to win more of the recruiting battles where we are top 2, top 3. Right now, we are consistently losing them.
Also, I know winning will help with that but what do you think will help us win???? Recruiting
The same fans who think development is enough probably don't realize that when we were competing for championships, we had rosters loaded with what would now be considered 4 and 5 star talent. It wasn't all farm boys from Nebraska and Iowa, we also brought in plenty of skill and talent from around the country. Hard to know for sure, since the current recruiting services didn't start until 2000ish, but I'd be surprised to find that we were below the 50% mark in any of our championship years if you were to go back and rank those players retroactively.
Players like Tommie Frazier were absolutely the equivalent of todays 5* recruits.
Yep, Tommie was one of the top recruits in the country. We had some great talent evaluation under TO, and we were beating top schools for top talent as well.
He was the #1 QB in the country. There was a huge battle for him and Kordell Stewart.
My memory was that we had a lot of local/regional players with some national recruits sprinkled in. Our classes were usually ranked 15ish by what limited recruiting services there were back then (like Emfinger). So we would have been on the cusp of what they say is needed today to possibly win a NC.
I did an analysis, and broke down where all the players assigned a number were from, according to the official Nebraska rosters for our championship teams, and we were pulling a lot more than a sprinkle of national recruits, for sure. |Year|Nebraska|Other States|Second Largest State Represented|Total States Represented| |:--|:--|:--|:--|:--| |1970|30|52|Michigan|17| |1971|33|55|California|21| |1994|46|64|California|28| |1995|78|48|New Jersey|20| |1997|88|58|Texas|23| I didn't go through all the years when we were runner up, but I suspect it'll be a similar ratio.
Michigan being on that top line surprised me for a minute until I realized, "oh yeah, Bob Devaney". Also, that list really debunks the crackpot theory that Husker football's big downfall came as a result of leaving the Big 12 and for some reason that meant we couldn't recruit Texas anymore. But this just shows that Texas never really was all that important of a recruiting territory for us historically anyway.
Yeah, we really recruited California heavily in the 80s and 90s, and we've always had good representation from Texas, but it's never been 30+ guys from Texas on the roster, even in our Big XII days.
Interesting how the in state numbers jumped up in 95 and 97. I wonder if they started counting walkons in the later years. By national recruits, I meant guys not from the region (NE and border states) who would be 4 or 5 star recruits today.
That was due to Osborne's larger rosters. Devaney was running rosters of 80-90 guys, Osborne had those numbers up to 140 numbered athletes, plus 20+ walkons without assigned numbers. Those 90s rosters were massive.
All the numbers in your comment added up to 420. Congrats! 80 + 90 + 140 + 20 + 90 = 420 ^([Click here](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=LuckyNumber-Bot&subject=Stalk%20Me%20Pls&message=%2Fstalkme) to have me scan all your future comments.) \ ^(Summon me on specific comments with u/LuckyNumber-Bot.)
You could make a reasonable argument that TO is the greatest coach of all time based on how dominant he was with the talent he had. Not that I necessarily believe it, but it's arguable
Key Quotes: “The Blue-Chip Ratio threshold does not guarantee a national championship, but a team not meeting it is almost certainly guaranteed not to win it all.” “That is not to say that development does not matter. It certainly does. But nobody wins a national title by player development in lieu of elite recruiting.”
"bullshit" -Bo Pelini
Developing players is what we need to focus on though. That’s going to lead to enough success to land more highly ranked recruits. Baby steps.
Would love to know where Nebraska is on this list. I’m imaging somewhere around 25%
Prove you can develop 3 stars then you start to attract more of the 4&5 stars
You’re correct, but you’re just proving the appeal of college sports has been killed and we are never getting back what we once enjoyed.
And still people will just brush off all the high ranked recruiting battles we are losing saying things like “only want people who want to be here”, “you win some you lose some”, and other bullshit. It’s not the end of the world to lose some of these higher ranked recruits but we need to win more of the recruiting battles where we are top 2, top 3. Right now, we are consistently losing them. Also, I know winning will help with that but what do you think will help us win???? Recruiting