A Sea Of Red

Dalegarz1 wrote: ↑December 23rd, 2022, 12:57 pm I was impressed with Coach Chadwell's presser. The difference in recruiting philosophy from HF is fairly evident and understandable considering the two different scenarios. LU was an opportunity for HF to reinvent himself (perception wise) and was only ever going to be an intermediate step. Consequently, recruiting efforts stemmed from a win now perspective and not necessarily to have a long range plan in place to put our team in a position to re-load every year. Listening to JC talk about the i importance of having a healthy mixture of underclassmen and upperclassmen makes it obvious IMHO that he is thinking long range roster building. He emphasized that high school athletes will be the foundation of recruiting efforts with Juco and transfers filling in the gaps. In short, there is a steadiness about him that has been missing the last 4 years. I think he is here for the long haul and I predict we will have great success under his leadership. Please don't hold me to to the standards of prophecy outlined in Deuteronomy!

I'm not convinced either recruiting philosophy is better than the other or that a coaches intent to stay can be determined by who they recruit. Coach freeze inherited a FCS roster and couldn't get solid high school recruits to give us the time of day until the end of his tenure. The caliber of athlete freeze was able to bring in through transfers were generally higher and he was always trying to get transfers with multiple years of eligibility. Chadwell on the other hand inherited a very solid roster with few holes that are needing filled and can't promise playing time as much to transfers. Both philosophies are attempting to win now without mortgaging the future to varying degrees and have their pro and cons.

Sly Fox wrote: ↑December 23rd, 2022, 1:37 pm

I was just about to look this kid up on Twitter to see where he went. Thanks for posting Sly.

Ill flame wrote: ↑December 23rd, 2022, 3:41 pm
I'm not convinced either recruiting philosophy is better than the other or that a coaches intent to stay can be determined by who they recruit. Coach freeze... Chadwell

Freeze also had the connections to land us several SEC players (Ole Miss OL & Auburn's Malik WIlis), but Chadwell has done well with his 2 ACC transfers so far.

Freeze also said he wanted to build the foundation through high school kids rather than transfers.

Does this mean HCHF wasn’t in the local schools?

aredd33 wrote: ↑January 17th, 2023, 7:09 pm

Does this mean HCHF wasn’t in the local schools?

I thought it was pretty obvious HCHF almost completely ignored Virginia the last couple years outside of transfers trying to be closer to home. The shift away from Virginia also coincided with our best recruiting classes.

Coach Chadwell has really worked the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida hard in recruiting in recent years. Coach Freeze obviously had connections in the Deep South. Coach Gill had ties in Texas. Every coach of any substance has his network. Recruiting Central Virginia shouldn't be the top priority for a school of our current stature. But it should be part of it.

It's nice to be given updates on recruits and transfers. Seems most teams do this on the LU website and here on SOR. It's too bad baseball doesn't participate in this practice of keeping the fans updated. Never see an article on LU website or SOR on HS recruits and/or transfers . . . . . or even a roster. Oh well!

Picked up a juco all american OLB. Hopefully there will be more on the way at LB. I would say that's easily our thinnest position.

I can't tell how our class stacks up with the rest of the new CUSA. Seems like it's near the top, but these recruiting sites do not cover the G5 well.

Liberty_2023 wrote: ↑February 1st, 2023, 9:44 pm I can't tell how our class stacks up with the rest of the new CUSA. Seems like it's near the top, but these recruiting sites do not cover the G5 well.

247 used to be pretty good about updating everytime there was a new commit even if they were unrated but it's gotten much worse lately. I typically gauge the quality of a recruit based on quantity and quality of their offers. Based on that we are toward the top of C-USA but it's tough to say beyond that. This is the most recruits with no other offers we've had since our first couple of fbs classes.

AATL wrote: ↑February 1st, 2023, 3:02 pm

Any idea who this was about?

It's a funny video but I would guess it isn't about any specific commit.

It might be time for a new thread because the 2024 recruits are rolling in. We picked up a 3* RB out of georgia with P5 offers and a TE out of NC with an offer from Maryland and app state. As always the hard part is keeping these guys when bigger schools come calling.

TE is a 2023 PWO

A Sea of Red wrote: ↑April 4th, 2023, 8:23 pm TE is a 2023 PWO

Thanks for the clarification. Do you know if the offers he talks about on twitter are scholarship offers or PWO offers? High schoolers love to exaggerate interest.

Likely all PWO offers especially when using phrases like "blessed to receive an opportunity."

A Sea of Red wrote:Likely all PWO offers especially when using phrases like "blessed to receive an opportunity."

I haven't paid as close attention to recruitment until recently, but I'm curious on the perspective of those who have in terms of the number/quality of high schoolers receiving offers and showing interest vs. what HCHF generated. From his earlier press conferences HCJC said his philosophy is to really push for high school athletes to build a team around and that portal stuff isn't as much of a priority/focus, unless is absolutely has to be. In terms of a culture fit for LU, HCJC seems to be more visible around campus and active in being a true face for LU than HCHF has. I'm just curious if all of that translates to us being more successful on the recruiting front. CCU really found some studs it seems, particularly on offense the past few years that made it to a 53 man roster in the NFL. Overall, it seems like we've been very active on social media, so curious if it's actually a real pick-up in interest, or not?

I don't think interest has really changed much. Freeze and Chadwell are both very effective recruiters and both clearly understand the power of social media despite having different recruiting philosophies. It may seem like there is more interest right now because it's that time of year when coaches are recruiting hard and making offers. Personally I think chadwell will bring in better recruits than freeze ever did not necessarily because he's a better recruiter and/or a better ambassador for the school, he just has a much better foundation to build on right out of the gate which goes a long way.

Ill flame wrote: ↑April 6th, 2023, 1:00 pm Personally I think chadwell will bring in better recruits than freeze ever did

I hope you are right! Chadwell seems genuinely sincere, and he appears to be "all in" regarding the LU experience, even attending hockey, basketball, and baseball/softball games.