Say hello to your newest commit...

Donate To GopherHole

Big get! love gettin them sconnie kids to turn the tide for the gophs!
 

We consider recruiting in Wisconsin as in state recruiting.
 


"LaCrosse is a border city, so it doesn't really count as a WI recruit." I can hear it already from the Badger boards.

Attaboy Brew! :clap:
 


I've actually had the chance to cover Matt for local sporting events, he's a talented kid, it'll be nice to see him in the Maroon and Gold. I wish I could give a better read, but I really never had time to focus on line play. On a side note, maybe less people will give me odd looks for wearing my Gopher gear around town.

fyi, the picture with the article is not Matt....but then again, that's what you get with Inside Preps, lol.

Welcome aboard Matt!
 

he doesn't have many impressive d1 offers, but I like his size! hopefully he stays committed as he says he will attend numerous camps and is expecting other offers. anyone know how strong of a commitment this is, inside info aka?
 


Is it correct that he can sign his letter of intent in November? Have football's signing rules changed to be similar to basketball's?
 



The Scoop on Eggen

old chap said:
"LaCrosse is a border city, so it doesn't really count as a WI recruit." I can hear it already from the Badger boards.

Attaboy Brew! :clap:
Click to expand...

Actually, "Wisconsin cooled on him," "his Second Team All-State was overrated," and "he has health issues".
 


highwayman said:
Actually, "Wisconsin cooled on him," "his Second Team All-State was overrated," and "he has health issues".
Click to expand...

Actually they never warmed on him, because he did not have a scholarship offer from the Badgers.

It will be interesting to see who has the better career between the in state lineman the Badgers have offered and Epping and Eggen.

The class in Wisconsin is very deep this year. The Badgers have offered 9 players, which is 4 more then they offered last year.
 

Wisconsin fan coming in peace, I always thought Eggen was the top lineman in the instate class, but its obviously apparent that the Wisconsin staff did not feel the same way. (he has not received an offer) I agree that it will be interesting to see which group becomes better( I expect you guys to land Epping as well)
 




troy he is not even in the top 10 .

he will end up on the dl for Minny.
 

TroyD92 said:
Wisconsin fan coming in peace, I always thought Eggen was the top lineman in the instate class, but its obviously apparent that the Wisconsin staff did not feel the same way. (he has not received an offer) I agree that it will be interesting to see which group becomes better( I expect you guys to land Epping as well)
Click to expand...

I'm not trying to knock Wisconsin for their choice of offering scholarships because I've never seen the linemen that accepted Wisconsin scholarships but I don't understand your recruiting strategy this year. I thought the consensus top 3-4 OL/DL in the state were Hardy, Epping, Eggen, and Cunningham and only Hardy has an offer amongst them. It may be that the consensus was wrong but the other players that received and accepted offers don't exactly have impressive offer lists to validate that the consensus was wrong.

I will withhold judgment until the players are in school--or even completed with school--but the situation has definitely piqued my interest.
 

I'll second that, although obviously it can be laughed at for analyzing a rival teams recruiting in June, I really am somewhat baffled at the recruiting strategy the badgers have had this year, almost similar to Iowa recruiting, but less precise and seemingly organized. First, they don't offer the concise top in state prospect (Z) then do after he commits to a rival, then they slow play every other in stater while seemingly other teams are offering, then this whole come to camp before we offer thing, and they offer several unheralded prospects who accept. Either they REALLY wholeheartedly know what they are doing or they REALLY are confident they do. Either way it's not a classic recruiting strategy. Interesting, but I suppose we'll find out down the road what plays out from it all.

For now Welcome aboard Matt!
 

They had Matt in camp alone with the kid that they ended up offering. According to reports Lewallen out performed all OL in camp and he got the offer.

As for why Epping hasnt gotten an offer, is due to the fact that he can play both OL/DL but doesnt really excel at either. While he may be talented enough, coaches(both UW and others) want to see more of him in competition.
 

grunkiejr said:
I'm not trying to knock Wisconsin for their choice of offering scholarships because I've never seen the linemen that accepted Wisconsin scholarships but I don't understand your recruiting strategy this year. I thought the consensus top 3-4 OL/DL in the state were Hardy, Epping, Eggen, and Cunningham and only Hardy has an offer amongst them. It may be that the consensus was wrong but the other players that received and accepted offers don't exactly have impressive offer lists to validate that the consensus was wrong.

I will withhold judgment until the players are in school--or even completed with school--but the situation has definitely piqued my interest.
Click to expand...

I think the problem is that the consensus was based on a bunch of recruiting rankings and not the coaching staff. The coaching staff is obviously going to know who the lineman are in Wisconsin, who they have a chance to get out of State and who they are going to target.

Considering the success we have had with Wisconsin lineman in general, they certainly deserve the benefit of the doubt. Cunningham is a perfect example. We have had great recent success with lineman from Hudson, yet we did not offer Cunningham. They obviously liked others better. Nothing against the kid, it happens all the time. For some reason Eggen and Epping fell into that position as well.

They have offered one offensive lineman from the State and he accepted. He was unknown by the recruiting "experts" but he earned his offer at camp. Eggen was at camp as well and they offered the other guy instead. Will they be right? Who knows. It does not mean Eggen is not a good player, it just means they liked someone better.

The notion that we suddenly decided to offer in State players only if they go to Camp is absurd. The Badgers have been recruiting the same way for years. If the player is an obvious Big Ten Player (Thomas, Oglesby, Beckum, Toon, Clay) to name a few, they get offered before camp. If the staff wants to evaluate them more, they are asked to go to camp. If they don't want to go (Epping) they don't go. If they want to (Lewallan, Irwin, Lewis, Trotter) they go and have a chance to earn an offer. I just don't know why that is such a hard concept to grasp.

As I stated, while there are not the usual 2 or 3 4 star players in the State this year, the class is very deep. That is not only reflected in the number the Badgers have offered (9), but the number that have BCS offers overall. The fun of it is to see who was right down the road. Unfortunately it will be a 3 or 4 year wait to see.
 

How many OL do you think the Gophers would like (ideally) in the 2010 recruiting class? Looking back on Brew's recruiting, you have:

2007: 4 OL commits
2008: 0 (!) OL Commits
2009: 5 OL commits (one was juco and one was Michael Carter's teammate)
2010: 2 commits so far. I thought I heard they wanted some kid from St. Paul as well, wasn't sure though...
 

Jwill, Fair enough, good for the kid who beat out Eggen in camp. As a gopher fan I hope the coaches were wrong, but I'm all for a kid earning a spot in one on one competition.

As for the numbers of OL we got 3 and a Juco last year, all 3 will RS (Jacques will be a DT by everything I've heard), we got 4 from the 07 class, none from 08, I would think Brew definitely wants to improve depth, the OL is a position that can be recruited locally and in the midwest due to the large Scandinavian and German populations up here, IMO it's never a bad thing to have 2-3big strong O linemen behind the starters. I would guess 3-5 from most classes, I think Henderson is an Elite prospect and will not factor in to the overall count regardless, so now we've got Gjere, Eggen, both tackle types, I think we still need a few guards.
 

KoolAid said:
How many OL do you think the Gophers would like (ideally) in the 2010 recruiting class? Looking back on Brew's recruiting, you have:

2007: 4 OL commits
2008: 0 (!) OL Commits
2009: 5 OL commits (one was juco and one was Michael Carter's teammate)
2010: 2 commits so far. I thought I heard they wanted some kid from St. Paul as well, wasn't sure though...
Click to expand...

"I thought I heard they wanted some kid from St. Paul." :) I like that one.

I haven't heard any official numbers but I would be surprised if we didn't take at least 3 and 4 seems more likely.

Another way to look at it:
2009 grads (Sr): 4 - Ruckdashel, Stommes, Tavale, Tow-Arnett
2010 grads (Jr): 4 - Alford, Burris, Carufel, Wills
2011 grads (So): 4 - Bunders, Davis, Orton, Wynn
2012 grads (Fr):
2013 grads (RS): 3 - Campion, Olsen, Michel (assuming all redshirt)
Commits (fit in to 2013 or 2014): Gjere, Eggen

Regardless of how many players are committed at OL there will be a space left open for Seantrel.
 

GVBadger said:
I think the problem is that the consensus was based on a bunch of recruiting rankings and not the coaching staff. The coaching staff is obviously going to know who the lineman are in Wisconsin, who they have a chance to get out of State and who they are going to target.

Considering the success we have had with Wisconsin lineman in general, they certainly deserve the benefit of the doubt. Cunningham is a perfect example. We have had great recent success with lineman from Hudson, yet we did not offer Cunningham. They obviously liked others better. Nothing against the kid, it happens all the time. For some reason Eggen and Epping fell into that position as well.

They have offered one offensive lineman from the State and he accepted. He was unknown by the recruiting "experts" but he earned his offer at camp. Eggen was at camp as well and they offered the other guy instead. Will they be right? Who knows. It does not mean Eggen is not a good player, it just means they liked someone better.

The notion that we suddenly decided to offer in State players only if they go to Camp is absurd. The Badgers have been recruiting the same way for years. If the player is an obvious Big Ten Player (Thomas, Oglesby, Beckum, Toon, Clay) to name a few, they get offered before camp. If the staff wants to evaluate them more, they are asked to go to camp. If they don't want to go (Epping) they don't go. If they want to (Lewallan, Irwin, Lewis, Trotter) they go and have a chance to earn an offer. I just don't know why that is such a hard concept to grasp.

As I stated, while there are not the usual 2 or 3 4 star players in the State this year, the class is very deep. That is not only reflected in the number the Badgers have offered (9), but the number that have BCS offers overall. The fun of it is to see who was right down the road. Unfortunately it will be a 3 or 4 year wait to see.
Click to expand...

I agree in part and disagree in part. If WI has a big time recruit in Wisconsin, they will offer early. If Iowa or Ohio State haven't offered, they'll slow play and tell them to go to camp. As I've mentioned before, for some reason WI coaches didn't call the top recruits mentioned above, so they passed on camp (Epping/Cunningham) or only attended a day or two (Eggen-if he went at all).

I hear all the time about how good Badgers linemen have been for years. But one thing to consider is they have a line coach who has been in the position now for two years. You can't assume dominant linemen will automatically continue under someone else. Maybe, just maybe, he doesn't quite have the eye for talent or ability to get the most out of him as his predecessors?

I think Badgers coahes were trying to make a point this year: Even though you don't get a call from a coach during the open window and even though you may have offers from someone else, as all the above do, you better attend camp or we won't offer you. Pay 300 bucks to attend three days of camp and only then will we tell you if we think you're good enough. This staff is loosing out of viewing in-state recruits even before camp happens...not a good strategy.
 

GopherInWI said:
fyi, the picture with the article is not Matt....but then again, that's what you get with Inside Preps, lol.
Click to expand...

Not only that, but also this...

"tuition runs an undergraduate student from Wisconsin $21,144 a year according to Minnesota’s Website"

Huh? That was some impressive research. Apparently neither the writer of the article nor his editors have never heard of this concept called "reciprocity." Not to mention capitalizing "website." The LaCrosse Tribune is clearly a bastion of journalistic excellence.
 

dpodoll68 said:
Not to mention capitalizing "website."
Click to expand...

Actually, newspapers are supposed to capitalize "Website" and "Internet". Believe it or not, they are considered proper nouns.

As to their other mistakes - well they were very shoddy.

And, welcome to Gopher Nation Matt!!
 


NDSU offerred him and wisco didnt. that means both NDSU + MINN beat wisco.for him.....
 

lakesbison said:
NDSU offerred him and wisco didnt. that means both NDSU + MINN beat wisco.for him.....
Click to expand...

Seriously dude...why are you chiming in on topics where you don't even have a horse in the race?

Pathetic.
 

GVBadger said:
Actually they never warmed on him, because he did not have a scholarship offer from the Badgers.

It will be interesting to see who has the better career between the in state lineman the Badgers have offered and Epping and Eggen.

The class in Wisconsin is very deep this year. The Badgers have offered 9 players, which is 4 more then they offered last year.
Click to expand...


This is a little circular and misleading. It's become well known that BB doesn't formally "offer" certain in-state players in part because he knows they aren't likely to accept. Similarly, BB has become notorious for the old "if you tell me you're coming here, I'll give you an offer" line. So when the player doesn't go to WI, it doesn't reflect so badly on BB's recruiting.

Ferentz and Bielema are good coaches but not elite recruiters. Brewster and his staff are elite recruiters. If we're not consistently beating those teams in another year or two, it will be because of coaching and/or other factors, not less talent.
 

Offers usually follow some level of interest. Nobody wastes an offer (and with my daughters heading to college this year, I found out it isn't just in athletics) on someone who is in the lukewarm category.

I don't know how good Eggen is or how much Bielema liked him or didn't like him, but I wouldn't doubt that Eggen indicated something along the way that sent Bielema in a different direction.

And I could be 100% wrong.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom