Recruiting never stops and it’s easy to miss the top stories day-to-day. Recruiting analyst Greg Smith recaps all things Nebraska recruiting news, analysis and more so you never miss a thing.
The strategy behind how many scholarships a team puts out is interesting. Unless a coaching change is made we don’t tend to see a huge fluctuation in offers for a program. For most schools the number of players that are offered is a matter of strategy. Some want to keep it exclusive and offer 100-150 total players in a cycle. Wisconsin does it that way. The Badgers have offered 119 players in the 2023 recruiting class. They offered 98 players in the 2022 cycle and 125 in the 2021 cycle.
Here is the breakdown of how many offers the Huskers have put out each of coach Scott Frost’s full recruiting cycles.
- 2023 cycle: 297 offers
- 2022 cycle: 402 offers
- 2021 cycle: 394 offers
- 2020 cycle: 444 offers
- 2019 cycle: 423 offers
The Huskers have had the strategy of blanketing the country with offers. At times it almost feels like the team is offering every Power Five-worthy player in the country. The thinking behind this was that to show the program was interested, it would offer. That way they had a better chance of getting a prospect on campus for an unofficial visit or an official.
That strategy seems to be shifting and you can tell from the Huskers having nearly 100 fewer offers out for this cycle compared to the previous year. Senior director of player personnel and recruiting Vince Guinta explained this to reporters during spring football.
“I think when you look at the process, I believe in following the process that your staff sets up”, Guinta said. “If the process that you set up is to ship out a ton of offers you want to do that the best you can because there’s a few people out there that are successful doing that. I think that we fall maybe not quite to that anymore. I think that you’re seeing, the numbers will tell you, the offers are not flying out. I think we’re trying to be very diligent in the offers we put out. But we definitely don’t want to be slow. We can’t be slow. We can’t. We want to be thorough but we don’t want to be slow.”
Streamlining the evaluation process for Nebraska is part of Guinta’s job. He’s tasked with combining film evaluation and background on prospects. The team does that as quickly as they can while being thorough.
We have seen many offers go out this spring and summer for the Huskers. A big part of that is Nebraska hiring four new offensive assistants and adding Bill Busch as a full-time assistant. Those coaches have different connections around the country than the previous group. A lot more Texas and Louisiana offers have gone out as the program goes through the evaluation process. I’d expect that trend to continue thanks to Bryan Applewhite and Mickey Joseph.
Time will tell how this shift in strategy plays out for the Huskers on the recruiting trail. The team is doing a great job of landing players out of the transfer portal. That’s covered up for a lagging high school crop in the 2022 class. A fresh outlook on prep recruiting could provide a boost for the 2023 recruiting class.
Recruit Watch
>> The Huskers offered 2023 in-state outside linebacker Kade McIntyre on Thursday.
I’d like to announce that I have received an offer from Nebraska!!! 🔴⚪️Thank you!!! @coach_frost @BarrettRuud @_Josh_McIntyre @LoriMc79 @FightingKnights pic.twitter.com/tbQ2dXp7p5
— Kade (@Kade_McIntyre) May 26, 2022
>> Nebraska defensive back target Braeden Marshall locked in an official visit to UCF.
Hey Knight Fans✌🏽 pic.twitter.com/9LYdQuLu9W
— Braeden Marshall (@MarshallBraeden) May 26, 2022
>> Gretna 2023 athlete Colin Sims will be competing at Friday Night Lights part two this June.
Blessed to receive this opportunity to showcase my talents at memorial! Thanks to @coachwilhite and @SeanDillonNU for the invite! GBR 🩸@PrepRedzoneNE @NEPrepZone pic.twitter.com/3ek57ftXQK
— Colin Sims (@sims_colin12) May 24, 2022
ICYMI
>> Jacob Padilla is gauging Bryce McGowen’s stock ahead of the 2022 NBA Draft.
>> Steve Marik took a look at the most impactful transfers on Nebraska’s Big Ten schedule.
>> Marik and I discussed if Nebraska needed to bring in more portal offensive linemen on the Hail Varsity YouTube page.
