Winning on Signing Day is critical to winning on Saturdays, or so we’re told. Given that it’s the middle of February and we’re a long way away from actual football, I decided to investigate the veracity of this so called truism. I went back to the 2009 season and compared 247sports composite team recruiting rankings, final BCS or Playoff Committee rankings, year-end AP rankings, wins/loss, and s/p+ strength of schedule for more than a dozen teams. There is a lot of really interesting data ...
Ben Davis
Jonathan Jones Saved ND’s Class of 2016
Jonathan Jones, the three-star linebacker from Florida, became the key to Brain Kelly’s 2016 recruiting class. I doubt that anyone who followed this class would’ve have said that before Signing Day. But given that Caleb Kelly committed to Oklahoma - despite the Irish pushing hard until the end - and Ben Davis signing with Alabama, Jones “saved” the class, at least on the defensive side of the ball. Daelin Hayes, a 247sports composite four-star OLB and early enrollee, is certainly the ...