Securing the Bag: Examining College Football Recruiting Expectations

Is your team recruiting above or below their expectations?

That nighttime summer evening breeze. The smell of sunscreen and barbecue. Also, and most importantly, the sights and sounds of college football message boards reacting to the latest news in the recruiting world.

Summer is in full swing, which means we’re entering whats known as a “dead period” for recruiting. This means coaches cannot contact recruits or their families in person. They are limited to phone calls, emails, or other forms of technological communication. As we enter this dead period, now would be a perfect time to look back and evaluate how teams have recruited in the past couple of years.

“Well how did you come up with the expectation"

To evaluate how teams have done in the past couple recruiting cycles, we first need to establish some sort of expectation for each team based on how they have recruited in the past. To do this, we use bayesian bootstrapping on all of a team’s recruits in the CFP era (2014-Present) in order to create a floor/ceiling for that program. Once we get that established, we can overlay the last 3 recruiting classes (in terms of average recruit rating) for that team to see how they are doing relative to their expectations.

*Note* Transfer Portal recruits are not included in this dataset.

First up as always… the ACC!

ACC

The fall of Florida State has been well documented at this point. As an alumni it has been… a very rough 5 years. While they still aren’t back up to expectations, the last three recruiting classes have trended back towards those expectations for the Seminoles. The team that took their spot at the top, the Clemson Tigers, continued to push their ceiling higher in 2020 and 2021. However, 2022 saw the Tigers take a little step back in terms of average recruit rating. HC Dabo Swinney has had to navigate in a new world of NIL without his superstar coordinators, who left to head coaching gigs elsewhere. Is this a minor speed bump, or something to monitor for the future?

Two programs that have recruited well to their expectations but haven’t really seen that translate to wins are North Carolina and Georgia Tech. Mack Brown is 21-17 since returning to the Tarheels. While they did make it to an Orange Bowl, they fell flat in 2021 after having some lofty expectations. Their situation is not nearly as dire as Georgia Tech, who just can’t seem to get any footing in their post triple option adventures. Geoff Collins has brought talent back to Atlanta, but it has not been enough on the field. In a year that needs some positive momentum, the Yellow Jackets have UCF and Ole Miss in the out of conference to go along with their usual bout against Georgia. Good luck!

SEC

To nobodies surprise, the two leaders of the SEC in terms of recruiting are Alabama and Georgia. However, one team is trying to earn a spot at the top and brush off some of their haters. The Texas A&M Aggies have been absolute money on the recruiting trail as of late, signing the highest rated class ever in 2022 in terms of overall recruiting points at 333.33. That class included 8 5 star recruits, including the #2 ranked QB recruit in Connor Weigman. Expectations have never been higher for Jimbo Fisher and the Aggies.

Due to my Florida State allegiance, I tend to see a lot of news on both the Hurricanes and the Gators. While I understand that message boards can take things to extremes, the reception for new Florida head coach Billy Napier appears to be lukewarm at best. This is due in part to some recent recruiting misses, which was not expected by someone with Napier’s recruiting prowess. Before his arrival, Florida was recruiting right at their expected level. While this is a high level nationally, it isn’t enough to get them back into the national championship conversation. It will be interesting to see how Napier navigates some testy waters in his first offseason as the Gators head coach.

Big Ten

The Big Ten has been Ohio States conference for quite some time. Both on and off the field, Ohio State has continued to push the gap between them and the rest of the conference. The two closest competitors, rivals Michigan and Penn State, can’t seem to really break through and challenge Ohio State in the recruiting world.

Its pretty incredible to see how successful Wisconsin has been considering their lower standings in the recruiting world. Giving the Badgers even higher rated talent could make them that more potent on the field. Of course, they still unfortunately feel like they’re stuck in the “one QB away” category. The rest of the bottom of the Big Ten appears to be recruiting quite well to their previous expectations. While it may not lead to a change at the top, it could provide the league with some exciting parity down below.

Big 12

The Big 12 will be losing the top two and most notable teams on this list, and will be tasked at replacing them. Before they leave, there will undoubtedly be more exciting Red River Rivalry showdowns as both Texas and Oklahoma look to squeak in a Big 12 championship before they leave. The Longhorns are under new management with Steve Sarkisian, who has done a lot in the portal to get Texas back to where they want to be. In terms of regular recruiting, his first cycle wasn’t as high as Longhorn fans maybe would have liked, but im sure getting Quinn Ewers in the portal and Arch Manning in the 2023 class has helped alleviate any worries.

One team looking to move into the top tier once Oklahoma and Texas leave are the current Big 12 champions, the Baylor Bears. HC Dave Aranda has done a tremendous job in turning the ship around and bringing a title to Waco. The Bears have seen increases in average recruit rating in each of the past three recruiting classes, which means they can continue to build on their championship season.

If you were looking for a low key team to watch and see if they put it together, the Texas Tech Red Raiders would be that team. HC Joey McGuire has deep relationships in the state of Texas, and we can see that already paying off in their 2023 recruiting class, where they currently sit 8th in the nation with an 87.74 average recruit rating. That would continue to push their ceiling upward. The Red Raiders also hired an OC who helped orchestrate Bailey Zappe’s record breaking passing TD season, so we could see a return to a fun air raid offense in Lubbock.

Pac-12

The Pac-12 may soon see its former powerhouse return back to its former glory as Lincoln Riley has arrived at USC. Most of the additions so far for the Trojans have come from the transfer portal, but Riley’s first full class at USC is currently sitting at an 92.61 average recruit rating, including the #2 overall recruit QB Malachi Nelson. Things are definitely looking up for the Trojans, and it will be fun to see a former power find its footing.

There haven’t been many disappointments so far, but it is safe to stay Stanford has been one of them. A program steeped with tradition, they have had a hard time recently, posting 3 consecutive 3-4 win seasons. Recruiting is always tricky when it comes to Stanford, as there are certain academic requirements that other schools do not have to abide by. Nevertheless, David Shaw needs to figure out a way to turn this boat around.

Kyle Whittingham has Utah in a groove lately, with multiple 10+ win seasons, a Pac-12 championship, and the Rose Bowl appearance that goes along with the conference title. The Utes have been recruiting at a high level against their expectations, and star QB Cameron Rising is looking to improve on a stellar 2021 season. There are a lot of things to be optimistic about in the short term when it comes to the reigning conference champions.

Conclusion and Tying It All Together

To wrap this all up, we can plot the three year average above expectation of each team in order to get a more wholistic look at the power 5. As stated above, it is not a great time to be a Florida State Seminole. While this doesn’t mean the program can’t be turned around, it is a great way to show how the Noles have fallen out of grace in the past couple of years.

On the other side, we have teams like Texas A&M, UNC and Purdue who have continued to push their ceiling higher and higher. For the Aggies, they are going all in to be involved in the national title conversation. For the Tarheels, its taking the next step forward and possibly hoisting a trophy filled with Oranges above their head. For the Boilermakers, the goal is simple: scare the living hell out of any Big Ten team with a ranking next to their name.

I split up the Power 5 and Group of 5 because recruiting expectations and “the game” are different for each subgroup (it would also be very, very long). One thing I noticed during this article is that a vast majority of power 5 teams are recruiting higher than their expected levels. It will be interesting to see what that looks like for the group of 5, and what observations we can make based off that plot. For now, remember the two most basic rules of summer: Sunscreen up, and don’t message recruits on social media!

If you want to dive in to the data like I do, check out @CFB_Data and @cfbfastR on Twitter, where you can learn how to get started in the world of College Football data analysis!

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Photo Thumbnail: Getty Images