WKU Recruiting: Pre-Signing Day Notebook
Tomorrow would usually be one hell of a day. But, with the new signing period, 15 players are already future Hilltoppers, meaning there are…
Tomorrow would usually be one hell of a day. But, with the new signing period, 15 players are already future Hilltoppers, meaning there are just a handful of guys still to get national letters of intent from. So that’s…doable, right?
Well, before things get ramped up, let’s take a peak at how WKU is looking ahead of tomorrow and some other WKU-related things.
Sanford featured in The Athletic
Ahead of NSD, The Athletic did a fun piece centered (kind of) around Mike Sanford about how he, and other coaches around college football, are using social media to connect with recruits.
“Twitter direct messaging is still to me the most consistent mode of communication,” he told Nicole Auerbach in the article (sorry, that’s all you’re getting here — if you wanna read it, you’ll have to subscribe. It’s worth it, though.). He says that Twitter is the “professional forum” of high school athletes and it’s how they really conduct their business in a professional manner. (As opposed to, say, Instagram or Snapchat, where Sanford says that’s where he let’s his guys be…well, guys.)
It’s clear Sanford connects to the kids on the recruiting trail like few WKU coaches have in the past, and it’s awesome to have, but that recruiting success needs to turn into on-field success and fast (not that this is news to any of you), but the fact that the Tops’ class didn’t take a huge hit after a disappointing year is a good sign.
How the Tops are stackin’ up
WKU is in good shape, pretty much across the board, in the 2018 recruiting rankings. Rivals has the Tops as tied for the 68th best-class in the country, and the third-best C-USA class.
247Sports sees it a bit differently, with WKU as the 80th-best class in the country and the third-best class in the conference (being beat out by the Panthers and La Tech).
Count the ‘Croots
By my count, the Tops need to snag 12 NLI’s from verbal commits tomorrow:
Kawan Williams
Bryson Washington
Roderic Forts
Nazir Sy
Deporess Schletty
Tre Leslie
Troy Ingle
Mason Brooks
Garland LaFrance
Jay Gibson
Lee Graham
Anthony Spurlock
A key name not on that list, unfortunately, is Terez Traynor, who isn’t expected to sign due to academic reasons. Hopefully wherever his career path takes him, he finds success and maybe, just maybe, can find his way back to the Hill some day.
Brooks, LaFrance, Gibson and Spurlock are all recent verbal commits, and will be nice adds to the class. The rest have been verbals since before the early signing period and the Tops were unable to nab them, but hopefully that’ll change come tomorrow.
Non-crootin’ thoughts
I wasn’t around much this weekend to give my two cents on the Tops’ loss in San Antonio, but here’s the thing — I don’t think it’s as deadly of a loss as many think. If the Tops are able to win out, especially if they beat MT at home, and are able to make a deep run in the C-USA tournament (final four, perhaps), I think they’ll still have a fighting chance to make it into a First Four spot.
UTSA is a team that, despite inconsistencies in their record, is good, and they could find themselves making a run in the conference tourney as well. I know it was a bad loss, but I’m holding out hope that it isn’t the nail in the coffin others might think.
I think…that’s going to do it. Hey, while I have you, be sure you’re checking out our baseball previews. The season starts in two weeks, and despite the poor predictions for the Tops, I’m happy to have the sport back.