20 offers in Georgia

[Blair Sanderson]

That's tied with Texas for the most offers in any state for the Hawkeyes.

Georgia: 20
Texas: 20
Ohio: 14
Illinois: 14
Michigan: 11
Maryland: 10
Washington DC: 7
Indiana: 7
Wisconsin: 6
Florida: 6
New Jersey: 6
Missouri: 4
Minnesota: 3
Virginia: 3
Pennsylvania: 2
Oklahoma: 2
Iowa: 2
New York: 1
South Dakota: 1
Nebraska: 1
Kansas: 1
California: 1
Connecticut: 1

This post was edited on 4/6 1:36 PM by Blair Sanderson

2016 Offer List

 

[Ufers_Spirit]

A couple of states that surprise by their relative lack of offers,:California and Pennsylvania, with one and two respectively. Clearly recruiting heavily where their coaches' strengths are. California's produced more NFL players than any state. Pennsylvania has been good to the Hawkeyes including nabbing an all-time great in Bob Sanders and it's where Kirk Ferentz grew up. Only 2 offers out in PA but 11 in state with usually inferior prep production, Michigan. Even Wisconsin and Indiana have 6.

Shows the relative strength of talent in the south with 40 scholarships going to just two southern states. Have to do something to upgrade the speed/athleticism of this team and the staff, I think rightly, believes that means going after more players in the south.

 

[GarryO37]

I love that we are recruiting the state of Georgia more. I have always felt that this was a state that Iowa should recruit/under recruited. Pennsylvania has not been good to the Hawkeyes in a long time, so I am fine with us placing less emphasis on that state.

California has never been good to the Hawkeyes. Couple that with everyone in the country trying to get recruits out of California as well as the 4 big in-state schools, and that spells Iowa not getting many good recruits. It's really not worth Iowa's time to try and place emphasis on California.

We have some good ties to Texas right now. Recruiting Texas makes sense, and it's one of the big 3 recruiting states. It was good to us during the Fry era, and it's been decent to us under the Ferentz era.

IMO, Georgia is an under recruited state considering all of the talent there. Georgia has more NFL players per capita than California and Texas. I believe there are a lot of kids who are still getting overlooked there. I think it may get overshadowed by Florida a bit.

The entire southeast as a whole has more NFL players per capita than any other region, but Georgia has a better education system than most of the states in the southeast. There's a good probability of getting more qualifiers than recruiting say Louisiana, Alabama or South Carolina.

 

[HawkNorth]

Maybe as surprising as the 20 offers in Georgia is the fact that there are only 2 offers out in Iowa. After signing nine Iowa natives in this year's class, let's hope that recruiting on a national bears some fruit. No offense to the Iowa kids, but if almost half of your incoming class is instate, the program is in trouble.

 

[Blair Sanderson]

Originally posted by HawkNorth:
Maybe as surprising as the 20 offers in Georgia is the fact that there are only 2 offers out in Iowa. After signing nine Iowa natives in this year's class, let's hope that recruiting on a national bears some fruit. No offense to the Iowa kids, but if almost half of your incoming class is instate, the program is in trouble.

Plus 1 of the 2 Iowa offers is to JUCO WR Taj Williams, who is in Council Bluffs at Iowa Western, but originally from Florida.

The other offer is to West Des Moines Valley OL John Raridon, who is already committed to Nebraska.

 

[BuddyRydell]

Originally posted by HawkNorth:
Maybe as surprising as the 20 offers in Georgia is the fact that there are only 2 offers out in Iowa. After signing nine Iowa natives in this year's class, let's hope that recruiting on a national bears some fruit. No offense to the Iowa kids, but if almost half of your incoming class is instate, the program is in trouble.

How many offers that go to in-state recruits all depends on how much talent is in that class. Some years there is quite a lot, and some years not so much. This last year, Iowa was pretty loaded with lineman talent, plus a no-brainer with Cook. And yes, they are talent. You always recruit your backyard first.

 

[Drew003]

Not sure I'm sold on recruiting Georgia. Its the heart of SEC country. And unlike Florida preps, where there is a long tradition of kids going to play for schools outside their geographic footprint, I'm not sure that is true in Georgia.

I'm afraid the only kids we will get out of Georgia are those without any offers from the SEC, Georgia Tech, and the southern ACC schools.

 

[northernboarderhawk]

Originally posted by Drew003:
Not sure I'm sold on recruiting Georgia. Its the heart of SEC country. And unlike Florida preps, where there is a long tradition of kids going to play for schools outside their geographic footprint, I'm not sure that is true in Georgia.

I'm afraid the only kids we will get out of Georgia are those without any offers from the SEC, Georgia Tech, and the southern ACC schools.

But the biggest thing is if you don't try you definitely won't get anyone. Got to start some where. I like what they seem to be doing with their recruiting.

 

[GarryO37]

Originally posted by Drew003:
Not sure I'm sold on recruiting Georgia. Its the heart of SEC country. And unlike Florida preps, where there is a long tradition of kids going to play for schools outside their geographic footprint, I'm not sure that is true in Georgia.

I'm afraid the only kids we will get out of Georgia are those without any offers from the SEC, Georgia Tech, and the southern ACC schools.

If this were true, no kids would ever leave the southeast outside of kids from Florida. Kids are leaving the southeast to play at other schools. Plus, I would rather have an under the radar player from Georgia than an under the radar kid from Iowa. The football culture in the southeast is extremely different than in Iowa. I shouldn't need to tell anyone that.

 

[ptownhawk89]

Originally posted by northernboarderhawk:

Originally posted by Drew003:
Not sure I'm sold on recruiting Georgia. Its the heart of SEC country. And unlike Florida preps, where there is a long tradition of kids going to play for schools outside their geographic footprint, I'm not sure that is true in Georgia.

I'm afraid the only kids we will get out of Georgia are those without any offers from the SEC, Georgia Tech, and the southern ACC schools.

But the biggest thing is if you don't try you definitely won't get anyone. Got to start some where. I like what they seem to be doing with their recruiting.

However, Atlanta is a transplant city. There is a fair amount of people down here that are not from Atlanta and even Georgia for that matter. So allegiance GA or the SEC is high, but it isn't as off the chart as one would expect. I will say there is a lot of in your face SEC and UGA media, but I've talked with a lot of people that are from the mid-west so there is a fighting chance for Iowa.

This post was edited on 4/10 2:49 PM by ptownhawk89

 

[Recruiting Violation]

Originally posted by Ufers_Spirit:
A couple of states that surprise by their relative lack of offers,:California and Pennsylvania, with one and two respectively.

We have no connections to Cali and while that is a big pond, there are a lot of big fish swimming in that pond. We'd have to recruit against the entire PAC-12, plus the Big 12 and the smaller western conferences (as well as Nebraska, see below). We have an inherent disadvantage in our distance that is tough to understate. California is farther from Iowa City than any of the other states above, and would probably not be worth the investment necessary to recruit heavily there. We have trouble keeping Florida, Texas, and East Cost kids from being homesick. California would be no better, and probably worse.

Nebraska has a history recruiting Cali, so it may not be impossible, but they've been drawing kids from there for decades and (unless it's changed recently) spend a lot of time and money there every year. I looked back at their last three signed classes, and they signed 4, 0, and 2 kids from CA in that time. If Nebraska's history, connections, and investment are only getting them that many kids, then I think we're better off in areas closer to home where we have some existing connections and history.

Having said that, I think improving the product is more likely to benefit recruiting than spreading our resources into more areas. We'll see if our new recruiting strategy will pay off, and if it doesn't, then we should expect some bigger changes to be necessary in order to convince 17 and 18 y.o. kids to come play in Iowa.

 

[SigMaintHawk]

Originally posted by Recruiting Violation:

Originally posted by Ufers_Spirit:
A couple of states that surprise by their relative lack of offers,:California and Pennsylvania, with one and two respectively.

We have no connections to Cali and while that is a big pond, there are a lot of big fish swimming in that pond. We'd have to recruit against the entire PAC-12, plus the Big 12 and the smaller western conferences (as well as Nebraska, see below). We have an inherent disadvantage in our distance that is tough to understate. California is farther from Iowa City than any of the other states above, and would probably not be worth the investment necessary to recruit heavily there. We have trouble keeping Florida, Texas, and East Cost kids from being homesick. California would be no better, and probably worse.

Nebraska has a history recruiting Cali, so it may not be impossible, but they've been drawing kids from there for decades and (unless it's changed recently) spend a lot of time and money there every year. I looked back at their last three signed classes, and they signed 4, 0, and 2 kids from CA in that time. If Nebraska's history, connections, and investment are only getting them that many kids, then I think we're better off in areas closer to home where we have some existing connections and history.

Having said that, I think improving the product is more likely to benefit recruiting than spreading our resources into more areas. We'll see if our new recruiting strategy will pay off, and if it doesn't, then we should expect some bigger changes to be necessary in order to convince 17 and 18 y.o. kids to come play in Iowa.

If a complete turd program, like ISU, can get a couple players a year from Cali, I'd think Iowa could as well... Even if the players ISU actually get from there are avg to below, don't you think Iowa could get a player or two that are a step above what the Clowns gain? Maybe KF should have hired somebody that had a tie or two out there instead of hiring a couple of guys that had connections to nowhere..While we are talking about ties and connections..Do you think it would have been beneficial for KF to have hired a coach or two that had some success recruiting the JUCO ranks? With such a depleted roster, maybe signing 5-7 Jucos over the past two years might have helped at specific areas of weakness this team has?

 

[millhawk]

If a complete turd program, like ISU, can get a couple players a year from Cali, I'd think Iowa could as well... Even if the players ISU actually get from there are avg to below, don't you think Iowa could get a player or two that are a step above what the Clowns gain? Maybe KF should have hired somebody that had a tie or two out there instead of hiring a couple of guys that had connections to nowhere..While we are talking about ties and connections..Do you think it would have been beneficial for KF to have hired a coach or two that had some success recruiting the JUCO ranks? With such a depleted roster, maybe signing 5-7 Jucos over the past two years might have helped at specific areas of weakness this team has?

Totally agree. My perception, right or wrong, is that with KF and hiring of personnel that recruiting is an afterthought. Up until the Wallace hire anyway.

Absolutely jucos should have been used to fill in at lber for last year. Seems like there was never any urgency shown. We have a few offers out already for jucos maybe Wallace is changing the culture there.