What Does Recruiting Mean?

What's always one of the first things you hear after a big West Virginia win? That should really help recruiting. But, really, what does that mean? Right now, according to scouts.com, West Virginia is tied for 58th in the country in recruiting...that shouldn't be too much of a shock...here's the past few years:

2002 - 33rd. Big recruit from that class: Durrell Robinson, wide receiver. Hmmm...a big 5-start wide receiver whom I never heard of. But, maybe more interesting is a couple players from that 2002 class who didn't finish their 4 years at WVU: Chris Henry and Adam Jones...both 1-star players. Hmmm, yeah. And this is the class that just led us, minus those two 1-star players, to a No. 5 finish.

2003 - 57th. Star of that recruiting class was a JUCO transfer (4-star) - Kay Jay Harris. He worked out pretty well. Not so highly regarded (2-star) was Mark Magro, Eric Wicks and Adam Bednarik. But they seem to be working okay for us.

2004 - 53rd. Commits included a 2-star unknown named Pat White. Or another one named Dee McCann. Hey, there is a couple 3-star guys...one being Darius Reynaud. But that was about it. No 4-star or 5-star athletes. But, Pat White has turned out to be alright.

2005 - 33rd. The BIG 5-star recruit: Jason Gwaltney. How has he worked out for us? Especially when you compare him to the 3-star Steve Slaton, one of the top running backs in the country. A 4-star guy on there is Pat McAfee...and, well, he was a nice addition. But this class still has a lot of time left to prove themselves...

So, I guess the moral is not to get caught up in all the talk to "blue-chip recruits" and ranking of recruiting classes. Pitt has had higher ranked recruiting classes (25, 39, 47, 42, 7) than West Virginia and that hasn't made much difference. Or look at Tennessee to see a high recruiting class not work...recruiting is important but the coaches know what they are looking for. People who evaluate talent...not so much.