Junior college recruits a key part of USF class

[Mama_Bull]

February 03, 2009

Junior college recruits a key part of USF class

On Wednesday, USF coach Jim Leavitt will unveil what should be the highest ranked recruiting class in his program's short history, and for the second year in a row, a big reason is a strong group of junior college prospects who will return to Florida to play for the Bulls.

A year ago, USF signed four Floridians from junior colleges, with Kion Wilson emerging as the starting middle linebacker and defensive end Craig Marshall finishing fourth on the team with 5.5 tackles for loss.

This year's group should include five junior college signees, all but one from Florida, including a five-star defensive end in Deerfield Beach's Jason Pierre-Paul. Three rank in Rivals.com's national junior college top 100 -- no other school in the country has three that rank as high as Pierre-Paul (6th), Riverview linebacker Jacquian Williams (21st) and Apopka tackle Jamar Bass (62nd).

Just two years ago, the Bulls had no scholarship players who had played football in junior college, but this fall, that number should be nine. Of this year's group, just one -- former Hillsborough defensive tackle Leslie Stirrups -- had signed with USF out of high school, but the Bulls have found success targeting in-state recruits who were forced to go away from home to junior colleges in Mississippi and Kansas and now want to play closer to home.

Junior college players are better equipped to step in immediately as starters, and Leavitt has several key holes to fill, especially on defense, where five senior starters graduated, and on the offensive line, which started four seniors in 2008.

Aside from kicker Maikon Bonani, USF had little contributions from true freshmen last fall, and the impact from junior college players this fall should allow the Bulls to redshirt more freshmen this fall as well. Williams will compete for a starting outside linebacker position, and Bass and California's Carlos Savala have a shot at two wide-open starting tackle positions.

The junior college trend should continue next year, as two junior college recruits -- defensive end Claude Davis and offensive tackle Justin Green -- have already committed toward USF's 2010 recruiting class.

WATCH LIVE: USF's official site, GoUSFbulls.com, has an ambitious plan for covering today's recruiting news, with a free "Signing Day Live" program, running eight hours of live video coverage, complete with highlights of signees and interviews with assistant coaches, all leading up to Leavitt's news conference at 4 p.m.

The Times will have live updates, analysis and interviews throughout the day on its college blogs.

THIS AND THAT: USF will honor longtime athletic director **** Bowers at halftime of Friday's home basketball game against Marquette. The Bulls will raise a banner to remember Bowers, who was USF's athletic director from 1965-82, died in November at age 77. ... USF softball opens its season with five games this weekend, hosting the Louisville Slugger Tournament. The Bulls host tournaments in each of the next three weekends and won't play a game out of the state until March 20.

Posted by Greg Auman at 3:33:43 PM on February 3, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)

http://blogs.tampabay.com/usf/2009/02/junior-college.html

[cubuffsdoug]

If you have too many JUCO players each year it hurts the long term growth of the program.  As soon as you sign one JUCO player you are recruiting to replace him the very next year, where as with a young frosh he has a few years to give the program before you think of recruiting a replacement.

[USF Bulls Football]

to many Juco's is a problem (ask UL), but i also believe having a couple biggy's come in every year is also important

[Bull^Shark]

Not too much of a problem for us. Our D-line/O-line was weak so we got some big help coming in at certain spots while we develop the young talent.

Receiver wise - we have some good ones coming so that kind of reduced the need of a Juco in WR Edgard Theliar.

[Bull Dozer]

If you have too many JUCO players each year it hurts the long term growth of the program.  As soon as you sign one JUCO player you are recruiting to replace him the very next year, where as with a young frosh he has a few years to give the program before you think of recruiting a replacement.

For the spot's where the Jucos are we need the stop gaps.  Some short comings with previous classes would force us to put kids in the line up who may not be ready or may not make an impact.  The good thing is the kind of talent that we have brought in the last two years is a much better grade than what we brought in 3-4 years ago but they do need time to develop.  The Jucos make it so we don't have to rush some of the kids from the last two years into the starting line up if they aren't ready.  However if they are good enough at the current juncture they will beat out the jucos and the jucos will just be for added depth.  I think with the way our depth is at the moment the juco route was actually a very good decision.  

[Jake_Ryan]

The JUCO's over the last 2 years have helped in specific positions of need.  Now that the holes are filled, and there is more young talent in the program (see last 2 recruiting classes), it is time to stop signing JUCO's.  One or 2 a year for guys who finally make it to campus like Kelly or Davis is OK, but we need to build for the future with Freshmen from now on.

[Dr.Brahma]

Some JUCOs like Marshall actually have 3 playing years left. These are not that bad of a deal to get.

That's almost like getting them out of high school

[SANJAY]

In the program’s first 11 years, the Bulls signed only nine junior college recruits. They’ve signed 10 the past two classes.

http://sports.tboblogs.com/index.php/sports/related/C127/

Despite that, folks always cracked on the number of jucos allegedly on the roster even before we actually had a significant number on the roster.

[Mama_Bull]

In the program’s first 11 years, the Bulls signed only nine junior college recruits. They’ve signed 10 the past two classes.

http://sports.tboblogs.com/index.php/sports/related/C127/

Despite that, folks always cracked on the number of jucos allegedly on the roster even before we actually had a significant number on the roster.

Just like they cracked on the number of partial qualifiers allegedly on the roster when we may have at most two about five years ago. People believe what they want.

[bulls96go]

seems like cjl has a "plan"  bring in Juco's to bridge the talent gap to make the next step in our growth. consistancy/depth = the ability to reload.