Big Ten Recruiting Class Rankings 6-27

Submitted by Tim on

Action since last rankings:

6-21-10 Minnesota gains commitment from Quinn Bauducco.

6-22-10 Indiana gains commitment from Jalen Schlachter. Iowa gains commitment from Henry Krieger-Coble. Nebraska gains commitment from Zach Sterup.

6-23-10 Indiana gains commitment from Jay McCants. Iowa gains commitment from Austin Vincent.

6-24-10 Michigan State gains commitment from Paul Lang.

6-25-10 Notre Dame gains commitment from Eilar Hardy.

Big Ten+ Recruiting Class Rankings
Rank School # Commits Rivals Avg Scout Avg ESPN Avg
1 Ohio State 15 3.47 3.67 79.20
2 Nebraska 12 3.33 3.25 73.00
3 Notre Dame 11 2.91 3.55 75.73
4 Michigan 5 3.40 3.20 78.20
5 Michigan State 6 3.00 3.00 76.33
6 Indiana 18 2.67 2.33 72.11
7 Iowa 5 2.80 2.00 71.20
8 Purdue 5 2.20 3.00 70.00
9 Northwestern 5 2.60 2.40 71.00
10 Minnesota 5 2.40 2.20 69.80
11 Wisconsin 4 2.25 2.25 61.50
12 Illinois 4 2.00 2.50 60.50
13 Penn State 1 1.00 2.00 76.00

Rivals and Scout are on the 5-star scale, ESPN is on their numerical rankings. In next week's update, I may convert Rivals to their "RR" rating. Please bear with me (and let me know) if you see any errors in the charts, as adding Nebraska may have screwed with some stuff that I didn't notice.

#1 Ohio State - 15 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Steve Miller DE 4 5 84
Braxton Miller QB 4 5 84
Michael Bennett DT 4 4 80
Brian Bobek OL 4 4 79
Chase Farris DE 4 4 79
Kenny Hayes DE 4 4 78
Jeremy Cash S 4 3 80
Evan Spencer WR 3 4 81
DerJuan Gambrell CB 3 4 77
Jeff Heuerman TE 3 3 80
Joel Hale DT 3 3 79
Chris Carter OL 3 3 78
Tommy Brown OL 3 3 78
Devin Smith WR 3 3 76
Antonio Underwood OL 3 3 75

Buckeyes stay atop the rankings.

#2 Nebraska - 12 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Bubba Starling QB 4 4 81
Jamal Turner QB 4 4 81
Ryne Reeves OL 4 4 79
Ryan Klachko OL 4 4 78
Tyler Moore OL 4 4 78
Tevin Mitchell CB 4 3 79
Zach Sterup OL 4 3 78
Kevin Williams DT 3 3 79
Dylan Admire OL 3 3 77
Daniel Davie S 3 2 NR
Aaryn Bouzos CB 2 2 76
Daimion Stafford S NR 3 NR

The newest member of the Big Ten is quietly putting together the #2 class in the conference.

#3 Notre Dame - 11 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Ben Koyack TE 4 5 81
Matt Hegarty OL 4 4 83
Eilar Hardy S 4 4 79
Jordan Prestwood OL 3 4 80
Jarrett Grace LB 3 4 78
Tony Springmann OL 3 4 78
Conor Hanratty OL 3 4 76
Brad Carrico OL 3 3 77
Matthias Farley CB 3 3 77
Clay Burton DE NR 3 79
Kyle Brindza K NR NR NR

Safety help come in the form of Ohio's Eilar Hardy.

#4 Michigan - 5 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Brennen Beyer DE 4 4 79
Delonte Hollowell CB 4 3 79
Chris Rock DE 3 3 78
Shawn Conway WR 3 3 78
Greg Brown CB 3 3 77

Michigan manages to stay ahead of the Spartans on virtue of average value per commit. Will they have a QB in the class at this time next week?

#5 Michigan State - 6 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Lawrence Thomas LB 5 5 80
Onaje Miller RB/Ath 3 4 78
Taiwan Jones Ath/LB 3 3 78
AJ Sims CB 3 2 78
Connor Cook QB 3 2 76
Paul Lang TE NR 2 68

Sleeper TE Paul Lang goes green.

#6 Indiana - 18 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Raymon Taylor CB 4 3 77
Zack Shaw LB 4 2 76
Max Pirman LB 3 3 78
Jake Reed TE 3 3 77
Jalen Schlachter TE 3 3 75
Ralston Evans OL 3 3 74
Nick Stoner S 3 3 74
Kirk Harris OL 3 2 77
Tre Roberson QB 3 2 76
Kyle Kennedy LB 3 2 76
CJ Robbins DE 3 2 75
Mark Murphy S 3 2 NR
Kenny Mullen CB 2 3 74
Mike Replogle LB 2 2 74
Donte Phillips DE 2 2 74
Jay McCants WR 2 NR NR
Shafer Johnson DT NR 2 77
Nick VanHoose DB NR 2 74

Hoosiers still paving the way in terms of number of commitments. They also have better quality in commits (two 4-stars?!?!) than they have in the past. I still don't think Taylor will finish ranked this high.

#7 Iowa - 5 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Austin Blythe OL 4 3 79
JaCorey Shepherd WR 3 3 78
Marcus Grant WR 3 2 76
Henry Krieger-Coble WR 3 NR 78
Austin Vincent WR NR NR NR

Iowa barely hangs on ahead of Purdue on the basis of Rivals and ESPN averages. When both schools' commits are fully ranked, we'll see how it shakes out.

#8 Purdue - 5 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Russell Bellomy QB 3 3 78
Robert Kugler TE 3 3 78
Brandon Cottom LB 3 3 76
Michael Rouse DT NR 3 73
Randy Gregory DE NR 3 NR

No change for Purdue. They're awaiting Rivals rankings for two of their guys.

#9 Northwestern - 5 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Sean Cotton S 3 3 79
Jarrell Williams CB 3 3 76
Shane Mertz OL 3 3 NR
Mark Szott TE 3 2 77
Max Chapman DE NR NR 78

No change in Evanston.

#10 Minnesota - 5 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Max Shortell QB 3 3 74
Tommy Olson OL 3 2 79
Quinn Bauducco LB 3 2 NR
Sam Rohr TE 2 2 74
Jephete Matilus LB NR 2 77

Minnesota picks up Quinn Bauducco and passes Wisconsin on the basis of his rankings.

#11 Wisconsin - 4 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Jake Keefer LB 4 3 78
Sam Arneson TE 3 2 78
Austin Maly TE 3 2 76
Eric Steffes TE NR 2 NR

Passed by Minnesota.

#12 Illinois - 4 Commits
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Zeph Grimes S 3 3 77
Chris O'Connor DE 2 3 75
Hunter Wells OL 2 3 NR
Marquise Mosley WR NR NR NR

No change for UI.

#13 Penn State - 1 Commit
Name Position Rivals Scout ESPN
Kyle Carter TE 2 2 76

Penn State still seriously lagging behind. Does that mean a slow start to the season could doom their recruiting class?

Comments

ThatOneGuy

June 27th, 2010 at 9:44 PM ^

I played against Zach Sterup; the Nebraska commit, two years ago (I lined up against him on the line). he's a four star, but lazy he'll play hard for 2 downs then start to slack, but he's HUGE.

His team (Hastings St. Cecilia) is my Alma's arch rival.

MrWoodson

June 28th, 2010 at 2:08 AM ^

What is going on with Penn State? One commitment? I know the state of Pennsylvania is supposed to be light this year, but that just means they should be working harder to pull from other states.

Irish

June 28th, 2010 at 7:33 AM ^

they made a lot of mistakes early in the year when getting their offers sent out and are suffering because of it.  One of their near locks just committed to Virginia

Irish

June 28th, 2010 at 10:30 PM ^

The scholarship writing coach(s?) were on vacation, Joepa was in Hawaii, and as a result had only offered literally a total of 6 (I think, it was single digits for sure) recruits in March.  It has put them so far behind, that they are losing out on many who were expected to be at PSU.  Its still far from NSD, but teams who changed their entire coaching staffs and much less to work with than PSU have better classes by a long ways.

Guys like Savon Huggins should have PSU the team to beat, but PSU isn't even a lock for his top 10 cut down.  Their lone commit Carter, who I am not trying to bag on in anyway, only had offers from Dartmuth and Delaware.  Albert Louis-Jean committed to Miami without even visiting PSU, I believe.  Brandon Phelps, just committed to Virginia over PSU; UVA ended their season in a 42-17 loss to VT going 3-9 overall, PSU just went 11-2 with a Citrus bowl win.  I don't know what they were thinking, but not getting those offers out has put them a long way behind the rest of the country, be interesting to see how it plays out

EDIT: Appears Pitt just stole another one, but PSU might just have doubled their commits

burntorange wi…

June 29th, 2010 at 10:50 AM ^

im assuming you are talking about marquise wright as the prospect that pitt stole from penn state? he had a PSU offer, so im simply guessing you didnt mean lafayette pitts(no psu offer).  who is the commit that you think committed to psu? ive been updating my twitter(im following a bunch of recruiting people) and i dont see anything on a new psu commit. 

jaggs

June 28th, 2010 at 8:25 AM ^

Do you think that given the relative rareness of 5* players (rivals has only 11 I believe) that this would outweigh the advantage of us having a 3* compared to a a 2* from MSU? Being separated by 1* keeps the average for M better, but you have to think at this point you would rather have MSU's class. Basically, having a 5* should far outweigh a few 2* not being 3*s. Thoughts?

ambamb

June 28th, 2010 at 8:44 AM ^

If early on one team has two 5* players and another has 2 4* players, the first class is obviously better. Now add a 1* to the first class, and the star average is now less than 4 for the entire class. Therefore we have subtraction by addition.

Tim

June 28th, 2010 at 9:12 AM ^

 

If early on one team has two 5* players and another has 2 4* players, the first class is obviously better. Now add a 1* to the first class, and the star average is now less than 4 for the entire class. Therefore we have subtraction by addition.

Your logic makes sense, but that's not what happened. Michigan was already ahead of Michigan State before the Spartans' newest commit. This case is more an instance of "no change by addition," since Lang on his own is not worthy of bumping the Spartans past Michigan.

The schools are basically neck-and-neck. Michigan was slightly ahead last week, and now they're about even. When in doubt, I'll keep them ranked in the same order thanks to inertia.

Tim

June 28th, 2010 at 9:10 AM ^

My main issue is that Michigan State has one star player, then, in all honesty, a bunch of prospects who are just guys. Michigan at least has multiple 4-star guys, as well as some lesser-rated prospects (so far) that had some other fairly serious offers - Rock held tenders from the likes of Notre Dame, Oregon, and Pitt.

By the time full rankings are released, there's a good chance Michigan State's current 6 could be better than Michigan's current 5, but that's not the case yet.

Kilgore Trout

June 28th, 2010 at 8:51 AM ^

Sorry if this is obvious and I just don't see it, but how do you rank the schools?  It doesn't seem to line up with any of the categories, so some sort of calculation?

Tim

June 29th, 2010 at 12:31 PM ^

Comparing side-bu-side and basically just going with which class looks better. There's a much heavier emphasis on quality of commits than number of commits (see Indiana behind Michigan and MSU), but it's basically just what I think looks better.

No scientific calculations or anything.

MaizeSombrero

June 28th, 2010 at 9:55 AM ^

I like the idea of using the Rivals Rankings. That would help give a little better definition. Also, you could add your own ranking because you editorialize on the other recruiting services' rankings anyway. Might be a way to easier justify your class rankings.

Tim

June 28th, 2010 at 10:04 AM ^

I plan to switch to the RR rating for Rivals once their rankings are a little more complete - though I guess I could do it as early as next week.

As far as my own rankings, I don't pay enough attention to all the prospects to actually rank them all. I have solid opinions on a select few, but the rest is simply based on some amalgamation of what the different recruitniks are saying.

Tim

June 29th, 2010 at 12:34 PM ^

They were just about dead even, but Purdue has more upward mobility with 2 guys currently unranked on Rivals. If you bump either of those guys to the minimum (2 stars), they would move even with Northwestern in average Rivals ranking as well.

Also, when two teams are so close in the rankings, I generally stick with the order I had teams in the previous week.