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Texas Recruiting - WAM Appetizer
DoogCourics
Member Posts: 5,739
Caple's latest piece. The rest is in the WAM you cheap fucks.
The thing is, coach Chris Petersen says the Huskies aren’t necessarily worried about their batting average. Success recruiting Texas, he said, is “a couple guys a year who can actually play and help you. Even one to three guys a year, I like it. But there’s a lot of competition in there in that state, with a lot of good Texas teams in there. So it’s a little tricky.”
The biggest challenge — aside from convincing teenagers why they should play football thousands of miles away from the football-crazed region where they grew up — is time and familiarity. UW coaches are regularly in California, for example, and have longstanding relationships with prep coaches there, so research on a prospect’s background is easier and more efficient. And, more simply, it takes a lot longer to fly from Seattle to Dallas or Austin than it does to shuttle between Seattle and Los Angeles.
“Any time you start going a little bit more away from your footprint, you don’t know as much, you’re not there as much, you’re not talking to the coach as much,” Petersen said. “That’s why I like being in our footprint out here. It’s the world we know.”
The Huskies still are trying to get to know Texas, where UW has offered 103 scholarships from the beginning of the 2015 recruiting cycle through 2020. That’s the second-most of any state besides California (and significantly more than in Washington, where the Huskies have offered 44 prospects in the same span, if you were curious). When the official UW Twitter account posted a graphic at the beginning of May detailing that week’s recruiting itineraries for its assistants, three of them were scheduled to spend at least two days each in Texas — including Kwiatkowski, who offered McDonald on that trip — and another was scheduled to stop there for a day.
That doesn’t mean the Huskies actively pursue every one of those offered prospects to the same degree, or that they expect all of them to seriously consider UW.
“If we can get one guy a year, that’s successful,” said Kwiatkowski, who also was instrumental in Levi Onwuzurike’s recruitment, picking up where ex-defensive line coach Jeff Choate left off. “… Recruiting in the Internet (era) is such a nationwide thing. We’re still more West Coast-oriented. We had success in Texas when we were at Boise State, and there are a lot of good players there. It’s just a matter of finding the guys who want to leave Texas and this (being) a good fit for them.”
Geography always will be an obstacle. Of the 98 Texas prospects with UW offers in that 2015-20 span who have signed letters of intent or are currently committed, 46 of them — or 47.3 percent — chose to stay in-state, per the 247Sports database. Texas and Texas A&M are the most popular destinations for Texas prospects who hold a UW offer — 13 players each, counting current commitments, have signed or pledged to those schools in that span, while seven chose TCU, four each chose Texas Tech, SMU and Baylor, and one chose Houston.
If you add in the eight Texas prospects with UW offers who instead chose Oklahoma and the six who chose Oklahoma State — for the sake of reference, consider that both campuses require less than a five-hour drive to the Dallas-Fort Worth area — that means roughly 61.2 percent of those prospects chose to play their college ball within a reasonable distance from where they grew up.
How does that compare to Texas prospects in general? It’s in roughly the same ballpark. Per the 247Sports composite ranking of the top 150 Texas prospects in the 2019 class, 71 either committed to, signed with or were thought to be favoring an in-state school. Add in Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, and that number moves to 89, or 59.3 percent of the top 150. Add in LSU and Arkansas, two more border-state schools, and the number rises to 96, or 64 percent.
Conversely, only 17 of the 103 Texas prospects with UW offers from 2015-20 committed or signed with schools west of their home state, a rate of 16.5 percent. UW landed six of them, more than any other West Coast destination among prospects who held an offer from the Huskies. UCLA signed three, USC and Stanford signed two each, and Arizona State, Oregon, Colorado and Fresno State signed one each. Only 22 of the top-150 Texas prospects in the 2019 class chose schools west of Texas, a rate of 14.6 percent.
Presuming Sunday and McDonald both end up signing, the 2020 cycle will mark the first time UW has pulled multiple prospects from Texas in the same class since 2016, when the Huskies got receiver Aaron Fuller out of Lucas Lovejoy and four-star defensive lineman Onwuzurike — their biggest Texas coup to date — out of powerhouse Allen High; both schools are in the Dallas suburbs. UW also signed outside linebacker Myles Rice out of Houston Bush in 2015 and pulled offensive lineman Victor Curne from Houston Second Baptist in 2018.
“It’s a lot of homework, and a lot of energy and work goes into it,” Kwiatkowski said. “Guys are going to want to go to other schools, and that’s part of recruiting. If we can get one, two guys a year, that’s pretty good. That’s what we’re shooting for.”
The thing is, coach Chris Petersen says the Huskies aren’t necessarily worried about their batting average. Success recruiting Texas, he said, is “a couple guys a year who can actually play and help you. Even one to three guys a year, I like it. But there’s a lot of competition in there in that state, with a lot of good Texas teams in there. So it’s a little tricky.”
The biggest challenge — aside from convincing teenagers why they should play football thousands of miles away from the football-crazed region where they grew up — is time and familiarity. UW coaches are regularly in California, for example, and have longstanding relationships with prep coaches there, so research on a prospect’s background is easier and more efficient. And, more simply, it takes a lot longer to fly from Seattle to Dallas or Austin than it does to shuttle between Seattle and Los Angeles.
“Any time you start going a little bit more away from your footprint, you don’t know as much, you’re not there as much, you’re not talking to the coach as much,” Petersen said. “That’s why I like being in our footprint out here. It’s the world we know.”
The Huskies still are trying to get to know Texas, where UW has offered 103 scholarships from the beginning of the 2015 recruiting cycle through 2020. That’s the second-most of any state besides California (and significantly more than in Washington, where the Huskies have offered 44 prospects in the same span, if you were curious). When the official UW Twitter account posted a graphic at the beginning of May detailing that week’s recruiting itineraries for its assistants, three of them were scheduled to spend at least two days each in Texas — including Kwiatkowski, who offered McDonald on that trip — and another was scheduled to stop there for a day.
That doesn’t mean the Huskies actively pursue every one of those offered prospects to the same degree, or that they expect all of them to seriously consider UW.
“If we can get one guy a year, that’s successful,” said Kwiatkowski, who also was instrumental in Levi Onwuzurike’s recruitment, picking up where ex-defensive line coach Jeff Choate left off. “… Recruiting in the Internet (era) is such a nationwide thing. We’re still more West Coast-oriented. We had success in Texas when we were at Boise State, and there are a lot of good players there. It’s just a matter of finding the guys who want to leave Texas and this (being) a good fit for them.”
Geography always will be an obstacle. Of the 98 Texas prospects with UW offers in that 2015-20 span who have signed letters of intent or are currently committed, 46 of them — or 47.3 percent — chose to stay in-state, per the 247Sports database. Texas and Texas A&M are the most popular destinations for Texas prospects who hold a UW offer — 13 players each, counting current commitments, have signed or pledged to those schools in that span, while seven chose TCU, four each chose Texas Tech, SMU and Baylor, and one chose Houston.
If you add in the eight Texas prospects with UW offers who instead chose Oklahoma and the six who chose Oklahoma State — for the sake of reference, consider that both campuses require less than a five-hour drive to the Dallas-Fort Worth area — that means roughly 61.2 percent of those prospects chose to play their college ball within a reasonable distance from where they grew up.
How does that compare to Texas prospects in general? It’s in roughly the same ballpark. Per the 247Sports composite ranking of the top 150 Texas prospects in the 2019 class, 71 either committed to, signed with or were thought to be favoring an in-state school. Add in Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, and that number moves to 89, or 59.3 percent of the top 150. Add in LSU and Arkansas, two more border-state schools, and the number rises to 96, or 64 percent.
Conversely, only 17 of the 103 Texas prospects with UW offers from 2015-20 committed or signed with schools west of their home state, a rate of 16.5 percent. UW landed six of them, more than any other West Coast destination among prospects who held an offer from the Huskies. UCLA signed three, USC and Stanford signed two each, and Arizona State, Oregon, Colorado and Fresno State signed one each. Only 22 of the top-150 Texas prospects in the 2019 class chose schools west of Texas, a rate of 14.6 percent.
Presuming Sunday and McDonald both end up signing, the 2020 cycle will mark the first time UW has pulled multiple prospects from Texas in the same class since 2016, when the Huskies got receiver Aaron Fuller out of Lucas Lovejoy and four-star defensive lineman Onwuzurike — their biggest Texas coup to date — out of powerhouse Allen High; both schools are in the Dallas suburbs. UW also signed outside linebacker Myles Rice out of Houston Bush in 2015 and pulled offensive lineman Victor Curne from Houston Second Baptist in 2018.
“It’s a lot of homework, and a lot of energy and work goes into it,” Kwiatkowski said. “Guys are going to want to go to other schools, and that’s part of recruiting. If we can get one, two guys a year, that’s pretty good. That’s what we’re shooting for.”
Comments
That is not worth the effort.
Everyone who said it was worth it argued that this was just building the foundation. Coaches say otherwise.
*unless we become Clemson of the west and can recruit nationally but no point wasting our time until that happens.
If the coaches have more time and resources than they can conceivably use, then sure, efficiency is irrelevant.
Hard to believe it though. Especially if UW misses out on a big name recruit from our area.
That's with how "selective" our recruiting is.
Do you think if we spent the time, effort, and energy that we do in Texas instead in the rest of the West and sent out 103 offers we'd only get six hits?
And you can't tell me these are irreplaceable kinds of talents we are getting from Texas either. There's no shortage of "depth" players in our geographic footprint.
It seems like we are trying to be mediocre in Texas instead of great in California.
Sounds like left over little dog mentality from Petermen. He needs to shed that mentality and be the premier program on the West Coast. Own it.
"Conversely, only 17 of the 103 Texas prospects with UW offers from 2015-20 committed or signed with schools west of their home state, a rate of 16.5 percent. UW landed six of them, more than any other West Coast destination among prospects who held an offer from the Huskies. UCLA signed three, USC and Stanford signed two each, and Arizona State, Oregon, Colorado and Fresno State signed one each. Only 22 of the top-150 Texas prospects in the 2019 class chose schools west of Texas, a rate of 14.6 percent."
It may or may not mean that traction is starting to be made, but I found it interesting:
When UW first reached out, Onwuzurike said he knew nothing about them. Fuller said the same thing: “Hadn’t seen a game, barely even knew where Seattle was.” Rice said he never considered leaving the Houston area before Choate started recruiting him. At that time, he said, “I didn’t know a whole lot about the program, or the state itself.”
It’s a similar story for Sunday, who said, “I didn’t know anything about them. It was my first time hearing about them.” But he did his research, connected with running backs coach Keith Bhonapha and expressed a desire to leave Waco for school; his unofficial visit to Seattle “blew my mind.”
Cooper McDonald was more familiar with Petersen and UW’s program, “especially when they were in the College Football Playoff. I was rooting for them. Ever since then, I’ve kind of been keeping an eye on them.”
He was ecstatic when the Huskies offered him a scholarship. So were his friends and teammates.
“They view Washington as a really good program,” he said. “When I got my offer, I had a bunch of my friends coming up saying, ‘Dude, that’s sick.’ ”
But all our efforts until then are wasted whether or not it ever happens. McDonald and his friends weren’t excited because Kawasaki was roaming the halls once a month. They were excited because UW was in the playoffs and the national conversation. You think Clemson had to “make traction” in Folsom? Fuck no they are fucking Clemson they just waltzed in like theyhad always owned the place.
That doesn’t mean I think the resources and effort are worth it.
Never said that, so don’t twist.
The argument against recruiting Texas is that we can be doing better in California. But who in California are we really missing on?
I get all the arguments but the reality is that culture and fit matter a lot to this staff. Those that receive what we are about will gravitate towards us. Those that don’t wont.
Ultimately the key in Texas is gaining traction. Getting a player like Levi is huge. As the Texas players on our roster produce and get to the league our reputation will only further grow there.
Until there’s tangible evidence that our efforts in Texas are wasted, then it’s a worthwhile INVESTMENT for the program to make if they deem that they have the resources to devote to it
Cooper McDonald seems like someone we could have found an equivilent to imo closer to uw.
In any organization the person pitching the new INVESTMENT must prove its worthwhile not vice versa. What are they teaching at TCU these days?
In terms of resources it isn't about the money. Its about the coaches' time.
Especially those coaches that aren't as successful on the recruiting front and may suffer the most with less time to devote to their west coast targets.
The position where we have by far the most disproportionate percentage of offers out in Texas the next two classes? RB.
The same position where our highest rated and most nationally coveted target supposedly wasn't hearing much from UW.