STrib: P.J. Fleck is fast and furious with scholarship offers – outside of Minnesota

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per Joe:

Fleck has preached the importance of recruiting Minnesota and a “six- to eight-hour radius around the Twin Cities” since his arrival Jan. 6.

This week, in a session with Star Tribune reporters, Fleck made it clear his stance hasn’t changed.

“We have a huge junior day coming up this weekend, and there will be an enormous amount of Minnesota high school athletes here,” Fleck said. “I think you might see more [offers to Minnesota players] after this weekend.”

Meanwhile, Fleck has been targeting players from recruiting hotbeds such as Florida, Texas, Ohio and Georgia, along with Missouri, Illinois and other states. Fleck hasn’t shied away from top prospects, even when they have offers from some of the biggest programs in the country. Alabama, Florida State and other schools can only sign so many players, so Fleck wants to be there early for players who might be looking to go elsewhere later in the recruiting cycle.

Some highlights among the 134 (and counting) offers:

• Fleck has offered five-star prospect BJ Foster of Angleton, Texas, a 6-1 safety ranked as the 11th-best high school player in the country. Foster is expected to sign with Texas. The Gophers have never signed a five-star recruit in the modern star-ranking era (since 2000).

• Westerville, Ohio, running back Jaelen Gill, 247sports’ 30th best overall player, has an offer from Fleck, among his 28 possibilities so far.

• Two of the nation’s top offensive tackles — Richard Gouraige (fourth-highest OT) of Tampa, Fla., and Ryan Hayes (13th) of Traverse City, Mich. — have Minnesota in their proverbial piles.

• Kimberly, Wis., defensive end Boyd Dietzen — the best prospect in Wisconsin — visited Minnesota in February and has the Gophers on his list, according to 247sports.

Fleck isn’t the only coach who’s made 125-plus offers. Wisconsin’s Paul Chryst has made 128 offers for next year’s class, Maryland’s J.D. Durkin 160 and Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh 172.

http://www.startribune.com/p-j-flec...arship-offers-outside-of-minnesota/414033273/

Go Gophers!!
 

To be fair, the 2018 MN high school class isn't bursting with great talent, from what I've seen.
 

So the 6-8 hour radius must definitely be based on flight range. Ain't anybody getting to Texas, Florida, Ohio, Georgia etc. in 6-8 hours by driving.
 

To be fair, the 2018 MN high school class isn't bursting with great talent, from what I've seen.

Fleck needs to fill Gopher roster with unranked players from MN, or he's a communist!
- Local Media, probably
 



Fleck needs to fill Gopher roster with unranked players from MN, or he's a communist!
- Local Media, probably

Unranked Minnesota kids has been the recipe for success for the fighting hawks. It only stands to reason, we should be filling our roster with kids from Dawson and Perham. :cool:
 

So the 6-8 hour radius must definitely be based on flight range. Ain't anybody getting to Texas, Florida, Ohio, Georgia etc. in 6-8 hours by driving.

Lol. Getting those kids to come from Belize is harder and harder these days.

The staff are hitting Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City and Indianapolis hard. Linguist and Smith have a big network in the southeast, so I'm not surprised by the attention they've been putting in there.
 

Unranked Minnesota kids has been the recipe for success for the fighting hawks. It only stands to reason, we should be filling our roster with kids from Dawson and Perham. :cool:

It started as a 'bit' to purposely confuse the schools from ND, but it has become so ubiquitous that now I legitimately am beginning to confuse the two schools and their mascots. Sort of like how I never used to have a problem with the difference between "then" and "than" until people misused them so frequently that I now have to stop and think before I use either one. Love it!!
 

It started as a 'bit' to purposely confuse the schools from ND, but it has become so ubiquitous that now I legitimately am beginning to confuse the two schools and their mascots. Sort of like how I never used to have a problem with the difference between "then" and "than" until people misused them so frequently that I now have to stop and think before I use either one. Love it!!

The beautiful part is that some on here still don't understand that it's a bit. That's when the fun really starts.
 



Yeah seems like a passive aggressive way of trying to get people going cause Fleck isn't recruiting in state.
 


As far as recruiting territories, here's how it breaks down by the staff:

Ciarrocca: QB's, and the Northeast
Burns: RB's, St. Louis, and parts of Michigan
Simon: WR's, Minnesota, and parts of Michigan and New Jersey
Callahan: TE's, and Chicago
Warriner: OL, Ohio, and Parts of New Jersey
Smith: All Defense, Florida, and Parts of New Jersey
Linguist: DB's, Texas, and Georgia
Paup: DL, Iowa, Wisconsin, and JUCO
Wenger: ST, Texas, and Indiana
Fleck: Errybody

From Goblirsch:
There won't be a significant change in how recruiting is handled, at least from territories standpoint, but guys will spill into other areas where they have ties, and some recruits will have up to 3 recruiters. For instance, Benny Sapp was recruited by Robb Smith (relationship with Benny Sapp Jr.), Matt Simon (MN), and Linguist (DB).
 

Yeah seems like a passive aggressive way of trying to get people going cause Fleck isn't recruiting in state.

But he is though....just because he hasn't offered scholarships doesn't mean they aren't doing their due diligence. All of the MN's top recruits are attending this weekend's event.
 



But he is though....just because he hasn't offered scholarships doesn't mean they aren't doing their due diligence. All of the MN's top recruits are attending this weekend's event.

And we as diehard fans know that. The average rube doesn't though.
 

As far as recruiting territories, here's how it breaks down by the staff:

Ciarrocca: QB's, and the Northeast
Burns: RB's, St. Louis, and parts of Michigan
Simon: WR's, Minnesota, and parts of Michigan and New Jersey
Callahan: TE's, and Chicago
Warriner: OL, Ohio, and Parts of New Jersey
Smith: All Defense, Florida, and Parts of New Jersey
Linguist: DB's, Texas, and Georgia
Paup: DL, Iowa, Wisconsin, and JUCO
Wenger: ST, Texas, and Indiana
Fleck: Errybody

From Goblirsch:

Good info. I would love to see the staff continue to land quality talent from Texas, Florida, Georgia and so on.
 

Good info. I would love to see the staff continue to land quality talent from Texas, Florida, Georgia and so on.

Gotta go with the not entirely honest Seth Green trifecta:

- Stole one out of the recruiting hotbed of Texas
- Stole a QB from Oregon
- Kept a highly touted Minnesota recruit
 


And we as diehard fans know that. The average rube doesn't though.

Honest question, do you think the average rube really cares? The only ones who really seem to care about this are the ones who see North Dakota's success and get upset that we didn't recruit those players.

I think the average rube would like this article. It makes us look aggressive. Maybe not, I don't know.
 

Unranked Minnesota kids has been the recipe for success for the fighting hawks. It only stands to reason, we should be filling our roster with kids from Dawson and Perham. :cool:
Are the Fighting Hawks the nickname for Minnesota Crookston?
 

Fleck needs to fill Gopher roster with unranked players from MN, or he's a communist!
- Local Media, probably
Getting Minnesota kids is the essence of Communism. Mediocre and all Comrades. [emoji41] [emoji57]
 


Honest question, do you think the average rube really cares? The only ones who really seem to care about this are the ones who see North Dakota's success and get upset that we didn't recruit those players.

I think the average rube would like this article. It makes us look aggressive. Maybe not, I don't know.

I think it goes both ways. You're right in that some probably see it as aggressive, others (the very provincial, "one of us" people) probably see it as "oh well Fleck isn't committed locking down the borders" when neither of those sides of that group realizes the '18 class is really bad
 

Lol. Getting those kids to come from Belize is harder and harder these days.

The staff are hitting Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City and Indianapolis hard. Linguist and Smith have a big network in the southeast, so I'm not surprised by the attention they've been putting in there.

Funny, I actually met a guy from Belize, in Belize who played college football in L.A. Small world...
 

Good info. I would love to see the staff continue to land quality talent from Texas, Florida, Georgia and so on.
One of the hazards of this approach-Wacker was an example.ple of this--you can't get enough talent from the South at the same to.e you are alienating your Mn players.

Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk
 

One of the hazards of this approach-Wacker was an example.ple of this--you can't get enough talent from the South at the same to.e you are alienating your Mn players.

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It's not alienating MN at all if the state Isn't producing enough talent
 

So the 6-8 hour radius must definitely be based on flight range. Ain't anybody getting to Texas, Florida, Ohio, Georgia etc. in 6-8 hours by driving.
No driving. What he said is that it was their priority area but they would go beyond that when they needed to. Good pragmatic approach.

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It's not alienating MN at all if the state Isn't producing enough talent
Right, not if you win. Key is--you gotta recruit. Brew also failed with the strategy. I still think you need to balance it, get a core group of 8-10 Upper Midwest folks yearly regardless of perceived talent. You miss as much or more with outsiders.

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Right, not if you win. Key is--you gotta recruit. Brew also failed with the strategy. I still think you need to balance it, get a core group of 8-10 Upper Midwest folks yearly regardless of perceived talent. You miss as much or more with outsiders.

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That's just plain silly. You get what you feel are the best players that you can, regardless of whether they're from Minneapolis or Timbuktu.
 

That's just plain silly. You get what you feel are the best players that you can, regardless of whether they're from Minneapolis or Timbuktu.
Not silly. NDSU, etc all are teeming with upgrades that were left behind by the Gophers--all from the 6-8 hr rim that Fleck speaks.

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Not silly. NDSU, etc all are teeming with upgrades that were left behind by the Gophers--all from the 6-8 hr rim that Fleck speaks.

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St. Thomas has also been successful with guys passed over by Minnesota - should we have taken all of them too? NDSU benefits from the fact that MN produces a decent amount of talent that isn't quite good enough to play in the Big Ten. Your comparison would be like Harbaugh getting ripped for missing on some Michigan kids that went to WMU and had a better record (although, this is closer because the MAC is a much better conference/level than whatever ndsu plays in).
 




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