HawkinGoferLand
Well-Known Member
The following data is compiled from Scout database.
First some facts. There are an average of 54 5-star rated players per year and 285 4-star in the nation as ranked by Scout. So 5-star players are rare and 4-star don't exactly grow on trees. There are over 1000 3-star players annually.
If you were to split them up equally among BCS level schools, that works out to four 4-star and fifteen 3-star per BCS level school on average and less than one 5-star.
Since 2002 when Scout began ranking recruits, the B1G has finished basically as the 4th ranked conference in recruiting rankings. Probably not surprisingly, the B1G as a whole has done poorly as compared to our peers in the SEC, B12, and P12.
The B1G has only signed 13% of ALL 5-star players and 14% of 4-star over the past 12 years. As a matter of fact over the past 12 years, the B1G has only signed 85 5-star players! 480 4-star. 1,151 3-star. Of the Top-100 rated players, the B1G only gets 16% of those too.
In the B1G, 78% of the 5-star players which committed to playing in the B1G have signed with the blue blood schools of Michigan, Ohio State or Penn State. Additionally, these 3 recruiting juggernauts have secured 64% of the 4-star players leaving crumbs for the rest of the conference.
These 3 schools have significant advantages over most of the B1G schools such as history, resources and in-state recruiting base as all 3 are near the top in all-time wins, have the largest athletic revenues and budgets, and reside in states/regions with large populations and large cities in which to recruit.
Iowa has historically (at least since 2002) signed classes ranked in the 30s and 40s. As a matter of fact, only twice have we broke into the top 25! 2011 at #22 and the infamous 2005 class at #8. Iowa has averaged 3.3 four-star rated players per class and an average Team Ranking of #39.
What may surprise you is that Wisconsin, Michigan St, and Illinois all average lower team rankings than the Hawks.
Even Nebraska with its 5 National Championships in the modern era only averages a #30 ranking! Only 3 times have the Huskers finished in Top 25 of rankings (#21 in '07 & '08 and #10 in '05). That surprised me anyway....
This should really get your attention: Wisconsin has NEVER had a Top 25 class! Not once. Their best was #26 in 2008, next best was #33 in 2010. They currently have the #25th rated class for 2013 and this coming on the heels of 3 consecutive Rose Bowls....They were #63 last year. Not exactly parlaying their success on the field into recruiting.
Michigan State which is in a recruiting hot bed of Michigan with close proximity to Ohio and even NY and the East Coast has only had ONE Top 25 class coming in at #13 way back in '04. They were coming off back-to-back 11 win seasons and only signed classes ranked #38, #29 respectively and currently have the #34 ranked class in 2013.
Here are the AVERAGE Recruiting Rankings for each team in the B1G over the past 12 years:
10 OSU
11 MICH
25 PSU
30 NEB
39 IOWA
39 IL
41 WISC
43 MSU
51 PU
58 MN
61 NW
66 IU
Population Data:
Nat'l Rank....Pop.....(BCS Schools)
#5 IL 12.9 million (Illini, NW)
#6 PA 12.8 (PSU, Pitt)
#7 OH 11.5 (OSU, Cincy)
#8 MI 9.9 (UM, MSU)
#15 IN 6.5 (PU, IU, ND)
#20 WI 5.7 (Wisky)
#21 MN 5.4 (MN)
#31 IA 3.1 (Iowa, ISU)
#39 NE 1.9 (Nebby)
Winning % since 2002
OSU 83%
WIS 70%
PSU 66%
MICH 65%
IOWA 64%
NEB 64%
MSU 55%
NW 52%
PUR 51%
MIN 46%
ILL 35%
IND 31%
Interesting correlation between population and recruiting rankings. More people=more recruits to choose from who are more likely to stay closer to home.
The state of Iowa only produces a handful of BCS level players annually. No where near enough to fill a roster. We land the majority of Iowa HS kids we offer, but with ISU instate and the Michigans of the world snatching the truly elite, we have to rely on neighboring states and developing late bloomers in-house.
The state of Iowa high school football produces on average less than ONE 4-Star recruit per year and THREE 3-Star. An average of 10 Iowa HS players commit to play for BCS level schools with Iowa and ISU taking all but a very small few (Arrington and Darboh are the biggies to UM and Barrent to MSU, Pipho to Miami). 6 out of 10 of those BCS level kids are 2-star or not rated.
So on AVERAGE, the state of Iowa produces annually FOUR (4) 3 or 4-Star rated player! Even if the Hawks sign all 4, you can't build a roster around that even if 100% of them pan-out. We have to count on finding the overlooked 2-Star and development. We are also relying on signing kids from other states, who grew up rooting for another team.
I feel some perspective is needed when looking at recruiting. Some are quick to point out that stars don't matter and site Bob Sanders and Dallas Clark to prove it. I don't buy that nor discredit stars, but there is a bit of truth to it.
Others look at one year in a vacuum to prove a point that Iowa is having a terrible recruiting year and point to recruiting success at another school such as Oklahoma State (thanks T. Boone Pickens!), Oregon (thanks Phil Knight & Nike) or even Illinois for a while under Zook. Iowa does not recruit with the elite programs, but neither do our closest rivals in Madison, Lincoln, Minneapolis, Champaign or even Columbia, MO. (Missouri Tigers average a #42 class since '02 BTW and have never had a Top-25 class).
Iowa, like Wisconsin, is a developmental program and can not afford to miss on many players and certainly can't afford attrition which has been proven 10 fold recently with our thin DLs, revolving door at RB and WR. We just need to keep the guys on campus.
First some facts. There are an average of 54 5-star rated players per year and 285 4-star in the nation as ranked by Scout. So 5-star players are rare and 4-star don't exactly grow on trees. There are over 1000 3-star players annually.
If you were to split them up equally among BCS level schools, that works out to four 4-star and fifteen 3-star per BCS level school on average and less than one 5-star.
Since 2002 when Scout began ranking recruits, the B1G has finished basically as the 4th ranked conference in recruiting rankings. Probably not surprisingly, the B1G as a whole has done poorly as compared to our peers in the SEC, B12, and P12.
The B1G has only signed 13% of ALL 5-star players and 14% of 4-star over the past 12 years. As a matter of fact over the past 12 years, the B1G has only signed 85 5-star players! 480 4-star. 1,151 3-star. Of the Top-100 rated players, the B1G only gets 16% of those too.
In the B1G, 78% of the 5-star players which committed to playing in the B1G have signed with the blue blood schools of Michigan, Ohio State or Penn State. Additionally, these 3 recruiting juggernauts have secured 64% of the 4-star players leaving crumbs for the rest of the conference.
These 3 schools have significant advantages over most of the B1G schools such as history, resources and in-state recruiting base as all 3 are near the top in all-time wins, have the largest athletic revenues and budgets, and reside in states/regions with large populations and large cities in which to recruit.
Iowa has historically (at least since 2002) signed classes ranked in the 30s and 40s. As a matter of fact, only twice have we broke into the top 25! 2011 at #22 and the infamous 2005 class at #8. Iowa has averaged 3.3 four-star rated players per class and an average Team Ranking of #39.
What may surprise you is that Wisconsin, Michigan St, and Illinois all average lower team rankings than the Hawks.
Even Nebraska with its 5 National Championships in the modern era only averages a #30 ranking! Only 3 times have the Huskers finished in Top 25 of rankings (#21 in '07 & '08 and #10 in '05). That surprised me anyway....
This should really get your attention: Wisconsin has NEVER had a Top 25 class! Not once. Their best was #26 in 2008, next best was #33 in 2010. They currently have the #25th rated class for 2013 and this coming on the heels of 3 consecutive Rose Bowls....They were #63 last year. Not exactly parlaying their success on the field into recruiting.
Michigan State which is in a recruiting hot bed of Michigan with close proximity to Ohio and even NY and the East Coast has only had ONE Top 25 class coming in at #13 way back in '04. They were coming off back-to-back 11 win seasons and only signed classes ranked #38, #29 respectively and currently have the #34 ranked class in 2013.
Here are the AVERAGE Recruiting Rankings for each team in the B1G over the past 12 years:
10 OSU
11 MICH
25 PSU
30 NEB
39 IOWA
39 IL
41 WISC
43 MSU
51 PU
58 MN
61 NW
66 IU
Population Data:
Nat'l Rank....Pop.....(BCS Schools)
#5 IL 12.9 million (Illini, NW)
#6 PA 12.8 (PSU, Pitt)
#7 OH 11.5 (OSU, Cincy)
#8 MI 9.9 (UM, MSU)
#15 IN 6.5 (PU, IU, ND)
#20 WI 5.7 (Wisky)
#21 MN 5.4 (MN)
#31 IA 3.1 (Iowa, ISU)
#39 NE 1.9 (Nebby)
Winning % since 2002
OSU 83%
WIS 70%
PSU 66%
MICH 65%
IOWA 64%
NEB 64%
MSU 55%
NW 52%
PUR 51%
MIN 46%
ILL 35%
IND 31%
Interesting correlation between population and recruiting rankings. More people=more recruits to choose from who are more likely to stay closer to home.
The state of Iowa only produces a handful of BCS level players annually. No where near enough to fill a roster. We land the majority of Iowa HS kids we offer, but with ISU instate and the Michigans of the world snatching the truly elite, we have to rely on neighboring states and developing late bloomers in-house.
The state of Iowa high school football produces on average less than ONE 4-Star recruit per year and THREE 3-Star. An average of 10 Iowa HS players commit to play for BCS level schools with Iowa and ISU taking all but a very small few (Arrington and Darboh are the biggies to UM and Barrent to MSU, Pipho to Miami). 6 out of 10 of those BCS level kids are 2-star or not rated.
So on AVERAGE, the state of Iowa produces annually FOUR (4) 3 or 4-Star rated player! Even if the Hawks sign all 4, you can't build a roster around that even if 100% of them pan-out. We have to count on finding the overlooked 2-Star and development. We are also relying on signing kids from other states, who grew up rooting for another team.
I feel some perspective is needed when looking at recruiting. Some are quick to point out that stars don't matter and site Bob Sanders and Dallas Clark to prove it. I don't buy that nor discredit stars, but there is a bit of truth to it.
Others look at one year in a vacuum to prove a point that Iowa is having a terrible recruiting year and point to recruiting success at another school such as Oklahoma State (thanks T. Boone Pickens!), Oregon (thanks Phil Knight & Nike) or even Illinois for a while under Zook. Iowa does not recruit with the elite programs, but neither do our closest rivals in Madison, Lincoln, Minneapolis, Champaign or even Columbia, MO. (Missouri Tigers average a #42 class since '02 BTW and have never had a Top-25 class).
Iowa, like Wisconsin, is a developmental program and can not afford to miss on many players and certainly can't afford attrition which has been proven 10 fold recently with our thin DLs, revolving door at RB and WR. We just need to keep the guys on campus.
Last edited:
