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The WSU version of the Hot Stove League has kicked off. The WSU Hot Stove League generally consists of off-season news that revolves around three things: recruiting, scheduling, and the coaching staff. We'll focus on each in separate articles this week. Earlier we covered our thoughts on the upcoming football schedule. Now, we're going to talk about recruiting and what the recruiting patterns are telling us right now.
Hit the jump below for the latest news and our thoughts on what's happening:
Recruiting:
This past weekend saw our biggest group of recruits since the Stanford home game way back in September. Sounds like it was a good mix of guys that are already committed and key recruits that could close out our class.
A thought occurred to me on Sunday night as all of the articles hit last night on Cougfan. I wonder if our hardcore fans actually obsessed a little more on our losses this season because Wulff moved away from regular visitors during the season. There is a lot of time spent about this and that recruit and how much fun they had or didn't have. It also is the best literal illustration of "hope" for the future. When you land a 3 star safety commit over offers from another Pac-10 team during a weekend where you lose it becomes easier to fixate on something positive. Just a random thought that was swimming in my head.
So, it sounds like we are starting to see our final push to close out this class. Clearly on the to-do list are a couple of JC olinemen, a running back, a JC dtackle or two to address need areas. Then I think the last two spots or so are really going to be "best talent" recruits. In other words, just take the very best football talents that you might be able to land regardless of position. I think you'll get a shock commitment like a 4 star JC safety or something that comes out of the blue as we get into January.
My impression is that we are head-to-head with Pac-10 and other national schools for a couple of JC olinemen. We lost out on one to Iowa State a few weeks back. We've got a head-to-head matchup with Tennessee and Arizona on a couple others. Clearly, this is the biggest indicator that the staff does not believe we have the talent or depth at offensive line to be a good unit next season. They are looking for immediate help which runs counter to their philosophy on recruiting. This should be a sobering thought on oline prospects for next year. The good news is that we are in on some serious talent at the JC level just based on who we are competing against. Look and hope for us to lock down two JC olinemen to help next season. If we don't, we should be very concerned about keeping Jeff Tuel upright for an entire season.
It looks like we are looking to take two running backs in this class as well. That indicates to me that Arthur Burns is now officially a linebacker. We are once again thin at running back which necessitates two running backs this class. I'm a little surprised they aren't going after a big time JC recruit here. It's probably the position where you can get early contribution and it would take the pressure off needing James Montgomery to come back and contribute in a big way. We are head-to-head with Northwestern to land a prep kid named Adonis Smith. Sounds like he had a blast in Pullman this weekend. Should be interesting to see where he commits after his visit to Northwestern. Regardless, look for another running back to commit to WSU this month or in January.
Finally, it looks like we are doing an excellent job of securing our current commits so far. It appears that ASU has taken a run at some of our Fresno guys. Asante Cleveland and Deone Bucannon turned them down cold. I would imagine we'll hear about Cal trying to get Halliday and Dunn to visit in January. Dunn and Bucannon are probably our most heralded recruits so far in this class so keeping them in line will be a big coup for us.
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