Big 12 Recruiting Roundup: Kansas State
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February 13, 2008 by
Like Colorado and Missouri, Kansas State earned a higher recruiting ranking than Nebraska from Rivals.com (#28 vs. NU’s #30) and a lower ranking from Scout.com (#45 vs. NU’s #21). The reason is a bit different than it was for Colorado or Missouri. The Huskers class was deeper than Colorado and Missouri’s, which drove the higher ranking from Scout. KSU by contrast has the largest class in the Big 12, but Scout discounts junior college players by a greater degree than does Rivals. And KSU has A LOT of junior college players in their class.
There were twenty commitments from junior college players out of thirty-four total scholarships. But two of those juco players failed to sign letters of intent (or perhaps had their offers withdrew late in the game). The star power in the class is all junior college as well. But there is a fair amount of star power. Among the four-star prospects are safety Daniel Thomas, receivers Aubrey Quarles and Attrail Snipes, linebacker Ulla Pomele, defensive tackle Daniel Calvin, offensive tackle Wade Weibert, and defensive end Grant Valentine.
About a half dozen of KSU’s junior college recruits arrived at the semester break, which will be important for the Wildcats. It’s critical that they make something happen in 2008 because they will be gutted by graduation along the line of scrimmage. KSU will have eight senior offensive linemen in the fall and behind them are only about a dozen scholarship players (if you include four that they just brought in). If that doesn’t hurt enough, four of those remaining twelve should graduate in 2009, leaving the Wildcats in desperate need to play catch-up in the coming recruiting year.
The defensive line is in seemingly similar shape as five seniors depart after next season with only four players behind them that aren’t part of the recently signed class. Most of the eight players just signed simply have to pan out for KSU to be viable on the defensive line in 2009. And if the Wildcats catch the injury bug along the lines of scrimmage over the next two years, they’ll have very little in ready reserve. The emphasis on jucos also means there’s no year on the horizon where they’ll be in a position of having a ready group of players and a young group to develop. They appear to be “picking a team” rather than “building a program” a la Missouri.
What this should mean for Kansas State is more of the same of what we’ve seen under Ron Prince. A very up and down team with the potential to look very good one day and very bad another. But there should be enough bad days to keep this team from becoming a true conference contender.
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Greg Morrow Feb 13 08
It is interesting, the disparity between the recruiting gurus and their evaluations of these 4 schools. That one service ranked Nebraska ahead of any of these makes me impressed with Pelini's scouting talent and Gilmore's changing gears and re-organizing the search. I though Nebraska finished with a nice class, one that'll add depth (or a lot of redshirts). Next year should be a year that the staff hit stride, at least with zeroing in on needs with their recruiting board. They claim to not look at *'s, but I think some guys they recruit will happen to have more than 3*'s.
Oh, this a K State topic...
One advantage K ST. has, is the JC network in Kansas, a couple of the best JC teams in the country. They've always brought in JC's, but possibly this time around they want to make a run while Freeman has these last two seasons left. I'll assume he doesn't turn pro after this season.
So they'll have senior dominated lines, for this fall? Should be a good indicator of how good they can get with Prince (or anyone not Snyder).