Battle of the Overachievers heading into 2021

[cidsports]

Overachievers: Power 5​

	TEAM	RANK	247	+/-
1	Iowa State	19	57	+38
2	Iowa	8	44	+36
3	Wisconsin	11	40	+29
4	Boston College	45	72	+27
5	Northwestern	30	52	+22
6	Oklahoma State	18	38	+20
7	Kansas State	44	64	+20
8	Wake Forest	41	60	+19
9	Utah	21	36	+15
10	Indiana	38	53	+15

It’s fair to wonder whether the number of Midwestern schools on this list is in some ways a reflection of the recruiting industry, showing that players on the commit lists of schools like Iowa and Iowa State might not get as much exposure and go overlooked. Though there’s usually some truth to that, the recruiting services aren’t wrong about most of these prospects. The majority of these programs’ classes are made up of three-star players who have intriguing traits and check the right boxes in terms of fit and need several years of hard work to unlock their potential. The best overachievers have created the right systems and environment to develop and deploy that talent. - The Athletic

The first impression here? This list is pretty darn Midwestern.

Iowa State is 32-19 in the past four years under Matt Campbell despite never signing a top-40 recruiting class. That staff has built up their program to the point that their three-stars are becoming all-conference players, so it’s not surprising to see them top the list.

The Cyclones’ rival Iowa has been sneaky good in recent years — would you have guessed the Hawkeyes were a top-10 team in the Massey ratings over this four-year period? — and is usually going to rate highly in assessments like these under Kirk Ferentz.

It’s no surprise to see many of the programs that rank right up with them. Wisconsin, Northwestern, Oklahoma State, Kansas State and Utah have long been known for doing more with less and sticking to their similar blueprints of the kind of players and program they want. They even play and win similarly as teams that traditionally make fewer mistakes.

Underachievers: Power 5​

	TEAM	RANK	247	+/-
1	Arkansas	103	30	-73
2	Rutgers	112	54	-58
3	Florida State	61	5	-56
4	Maryland	87	32	-55
5	UCLA	71	16	-55
6	Illinois	108	55	-53
7	Nebraska	76	25	-51
8	Tennessee	62	13	-49
9	Vanderbilt	99	51	-48
10	Kansas	117	70	-47

Well, there it is. The Power 5 programs that are doing less with more since 2017. If your favorite team made this list, you can’t act too surprised. The common theme among the top 10 is fairly obvious, too. Each program has gone through at least one head coaching change since 2017, and a few have experienced multiple firings.

Iowa has plenty of big games with teams on both lists in 2021