They might get to see more players they like, but many college coaches have fewer scholarships to offer as many programs opt to recruit from each other rather than load up on two dozen high school players per year, a practice produced by the creation of the transfer portal in 2018 and subsequent loosening of transfer rules.
“The (power conference teams) are picking from their lower division programs, where they’ve seen a kid actually play at the Division I level,” Beavercreek coach Trace Smitherman said. “They can come over from the portal and that’s immediate success, right?
“So you’ve got to be a top 100, 150 national prospect to really get somebody’s eye. And I don’t know for sure, but I don’t think they’re taking as many high school kids because they don’t have to because they’ve got access to MAC, and Division II and those type guys.”
A coach at another area program, who wished to remain anonymous, said a representative from an FBS program told him they might sign 10 high school players from the class of 2026 — or less — rather than the traditional 20-25.
That program is not going to go into next season low on scholarship players — it will just hope to load up on prospects from the transfer portal instead.
“You’re going to take a guy that can help you win right now,” Centerville head coach John Puckett said. “I can speculate on why, but I think the biggest thing is that college coaches know they don’t have a lot of time to develop a program, let alone develop players. They need to win right now. So what’s a better way to win right now? Go get a 20-year-old that already knows how to work as a college guy.”
He added he and his colleagues expected a trickle-down effect when the portal started to take away FBS scholarships, but not the one they have observed over the past seven years.
Rather than players who might previously have gone to a power conference school simply sliding down to a Mid-American Conference or Sun Belt program, many are ending up in the FCS or Division II, where only partial scholarships are available. That, in turn, means fewer scholarships available in Division II, but players squeezed out of that level face going NAIA or paying their own way in Division III, which does not offer athletic aid.
Additionally, many Division III schools are small, selective private schools with high tuition, meaning they are not an option for everyone.
“It’s been guys that we thought were Division I guys are now D-II guys and (formerly) D-II guys that are scholarship-worthy are now not playing anymore because they don’t want to go play at a Division III school,” Puckett said.
Credit: Marcus Hartman
Credit: Marcus Hartman
Aside from a numbers crunch, coaches have also seen recruiting tactics evolve.
Springfield coach Maurice Douglass told this news outlet on National Signing Day in February he had multiple players receive Division I offers last spring and early summer that they later learned were no longer good in the fall — without being told that might be the case when the offer was issued.
Xenia coach Maurice Harden said he has noticed the same thing happen to players within his program over the past year.
That makes his players treating their recruitment like a business decision even more essential.
“I think you try to be as transparent as you can and just try to get them to understand that it is a business,” Harden said. “They’ve got to know that, so they’ve got to figure out what best works financially, figure out what you can deal with. I always say look at the school, and if you could go to school there without playing football, you envision that first because coaches leave, things change.”
Of course, the transfer portal can be a two-way street.
While getting a spot on an FBS program roster is more difficult, changing schools after entering college is much easier.
Going that circuitous route might even work better for some players, but it’s easier said than done.
“I think the right kid with the right kind of mindset can kind of take advantage of it by going to a lower level and playing at a high level and then getting in the portal and going to a bigger school than he probably would have if he was coming right out of high school,” Puckett said.
“So I think you can play it both ways, but the biggest thing with recruiting now is that they, hey, they’re not going after high school guys and they’re proving that by just there’s not as much traffic. I mean, a place like Centerville, we used to be overloaded with college coaches, and that has not been the case this year.”
Credit: Marcus Hartman
Credit: Marcus Hartman
That makes the recruiting showcases even more valuable, however.
“A lot of our kids don’t get to go to all the (college) camps that are offered out there,” Fairmont coach Dave Miller said during his team’s workout at Centerville. “It’s really hard to do that, so bringing these guys to us where they can actually see them is really beneficial I think.
“I’ve talked to coaches about our kids, coaches who put eyes on them who would not have otherwise, so it’s a good thing overall.”
A day later, Smitherman also expressed satisfaction.
Credit: Marcus Hartman
Credit: Marcus Hartman
“I would imagine 70 different schools were there, so it was a great turnout by them,” said Smitherman, whose team’s audience at Springfield included coaches from Division I FBS programs Kentucky, West Virginia, Louisville, Purdue, Maryland, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Temple, Toledo, Kent State, Miami (Ohio), Bowling Green, Ohio, Eastern Michigan, Western Michigan, Central Michigan, Navy and Massachusetts among others.
“Solid day for weather, for what we were trying to get accomplished, and our kids have not had that opportunity to be in front of those type of coaches and those type of schools.”
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