From the Desk of Jim Snyder
The Class of 2006
The Pantherlair has published a half dozen articles this week on juniors that Pitt is looking at from Western PA. The Rivals network also reported on a number of other prospects from the state of Pennsylvania. It is still very, very early in the process. There is a lot of video to look at. Many of the prospects will attend the Nike Camps or the Metro Index Camp. However, our early read is that Western PA is not likely to have many if any five-star prospects. On the other hand, there should be more than two dozen legitimate prospects in Western PA. Some are good enough that you can expect stiff competition from a number of Big Ten schools including Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State. One of our colleagues was talking to Penn State assistant Tom Bradley who made a similar observation. It is still early in the process.
Bishop McDevitt in Harrisburg has 3 of the top prospects in the state. McDevitt went to the state AAAA semi-finals before being stopped by Central Catholic. Rivals.com has LeSean McCoy, Jeremy Ricker and Jason Kates ranked in their Top 100 in the country regardless of position. McCoy and Akron Garfield running back Chris Wells were picked on Rivals 2006 Junior All-American team as their top two running backs. Wells already committed to Ohio State after West Virginia got Jason Gwaltney in the Class of 2005. This means that McCoy figures to be the most heavily recruited running back in the country this year. He has already been discussed in a couple of the AMP features by Rivals.com.
Three PA quarterbacks were invited to the junior combines in San Antonio the week of the US Army All-American game. Pat Devlin from Downingtown East, Zach Frazier from Mechanicsburg and Jeremy Ricker from McDevitt all figure to be highly recruited. Devlin and Ricker are ranked in Rivals Top 100. Frazer was the state AAA Player of the Year, so he can’t be far behind.
There are a number of good prospects locally from Thomas Jefferson, West Allegheny, Baldwin, Woodland Hills and Burrell. These are all schools, which should give Dave Wannstedt and his staff a fair hearing, maybe even more than fair. It does not mean Pitt is a lock to sign them but it does mean they should be able to get their selling points across without a coach putting a negative spin on Pitt.
We were interviewing Woodland Hills linebacker Greg Webster and we were reviewing the schools in the database attached to his profile. He said he liked all of those schools except Penn State. He wasn’t too comfortable with having the Penn State name associated with his name. I have a feeling this guy would be a fan favorite at Heinz Field. Late last week, we were talking to George Novak who reminded me that he has sent nine players to Pitt. He said we have a lot of Pitt fans at this school. However, there are a few teachers working there who graduated from Penn State. Most people at the school pretend they are not there. LOL!
It is our understanding that Coach Wannstedt visited a few area high schools that did not have junior or senior prospects. It was simply a part of establishing relationships with the high school coaches. These coaches are the early warning system for promising underclassmen.
Some visitors that got away
A number of players that made “official visits” to Pittsburgh ended up signing with other schools. Lawrence Wilson (Ohio State), Rico McCoy (Tennessee), William Berger (Illinois), Kurt Mattes (Northwestern), Rob Mahler (Delaware), Gary Watts (Rutgers), Garrett White (North Carolina), Craig Carey (Cincinnati), Chris Joppru (Utah) and Dennis Brown (Connecticut) all visited Pittsburgh but for various reasons went in different directions.
You can’t keep everyone happy
Former Pitt assistant JD Brookhart signed 23 players for Akron on Letter of Intent Day including four 3-star prospects. The publisher of Ohio High magazine called Brookhart’s class the best in the MAC Conference. A few recruiting experts said Brookhart may have had a better class than a couple of Big Ten schools. So everybody in Akron is happy, right? Not exactly. A few Akron high school coaches including my friend Claude Brown at Akron Buchtel are complaining that too many scholarships were given to out-of-state kids. Akron signed 9 from Pennsylvania and 7 from other states (primarily Florida). It seems I have seen this movie before. The college coach is trying his best to win. The high school coach wants scholarship for the local kids. You can’t keep everyone happy.
Watch the Syracuse game with Pitt fans
DT_Pitt is trying to put together a group of Pitt fans to watch the Syracuse game at the Rock Bottom Restaurant in Homestead. Last year he had a large group and is trying to have an equally large turnout this year. See the top of the basketball board for details.
Rivals Radio
Keep in mind that if you are not able to listen to Rivals Radio live from 10:00 AM until Noon EST you may want to listen to “segments” which are archived on the Rivals Radio page.
Kudos to the computer folks
The Pantherlair and Rivals.com continue to grow at a very rapid pace. The hiring of Dave Wannstedt has reenergized the Pitt fan base. The Pantherlair had over 8.6 million page views in December and January. On Letter of Intent Day the Rivals network had almost 39 million page views. The system was able to handle the heavy volume. Congratulations to the system folks at Rivals.com.
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
Note to Pantherlair.com Fans: The staff at Pantherlair.com works diligently to bring you the best information on University of Pittsburgh football and basketball recruiting (in addition to game coverage). Thousands of Panther fans visit our site on a daily basis. We have received a tremendous amount of e-mail thanking us for our efforts. If you like our site, please feel free to tell other fans about it. “Spread the word” and let’s add to our online family of Panther fans.
The Class of 2006
The Pantherlair has published a half dozen articles this week on juniors that Pitt is looking at from Western PA. The Rivals network also reported on a number of other prospects from the state of Pennsylvania. It is still very, very early in the process. There is a lot of video to look at. Many of the prospects will attend the Nike Camps or the Metro Index Camp. However, our early read is that Western PA is not likely to have many if any five-star prospects. On the other hand, there should be more than two dozen legitimate prospects in Western PA. Some are good enough that you can expect stiff competition from a number of Big Ten schools including Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State. One of our colleagues was talking to Penn State assistant Tom Bradley who made a similar observation. It is still early in the process.
Bishop McDevitt in Harrisburg has 3 of the top prospects in the state. McDevitt went to the state AAAA semi-finals before being stopped by Central Catholic. Rivals.com has LeSean McCoy, Jeremy Ricker and Jason Kates ranked in their Top 100 in the country regardless of position. McCoy and Akron Garfield running back Chris Wells were picked on Rivals 2006 Junior All-American team as their top two running backs. Wells already committed to Ohio State after West Virginia got Jason Gwaltney in the Class of 2005. This means that McCoy figures to be the most heavily recruited running back in the country this year. He has already been discussed in a couple of the AMP features by Rivals.com.
Three PA quarterbacks were invited to the junior combines in San Antonio the week of the US Army All-American game. Pat Devlin from Downingtown East, Zach Frazier from Mechanicsburg and Jeremy Ricker from McDevitt all figure to be highly recruited. Devlin and Ricker are ranked in Rivals Top 100. Frazer was the state AAA Player of the Year, so he can’t be far behind.
There are a number of good prospects locally from Thomas Jefferson, West Allegheny, Baldwin, Woodland Hills and Burrell. These are all schools, which should give Dave Wannstedt and his staff a fair hearing, maybe even more than fair. It does not mean Pitt is a lock to sign them but it does mean they should be able to get their selling points across without a coach putting a negative spin on Pitt.
We were interviewing Woodland Hills linebacker Greg Webster and we were reviewing the schools in the database attached to his profile. He said he liked all of those schools except Penn State. He wasn’t too comfortable with having the Penn State name associated with his name. I have a feeling this guy would be a fan favorite at Heinz Field. Late last week, we were talking to George Novak who reminded me that he has sent nine players to Pitt. He said we have a lot of Pitt fans at this school. However, there are a few teachers working there who graduated from Penn State. Most people at the school pretend they are not there. LOL!
It is our understanding that Coach Wannstedt visited a few area high schools that did not have junior or senior prospects. It was simply a part of establishing relationships with the high school coaches. These coaches are the early warning system for promising underclassmen.
Some visitors that got away
A number of players that made “official visits” to Pittsburgh ended up signing with other schools. Lawrence Wilson (Ohio State), Rico McCoy (Tennessee), William Berger (Illinois), Kurt Mattes (Northwestern), Rob Mahler (Delaware), Gary Watts (Rutgers), Garrett White (North Carolina), Craig Carey (Cincinnati), Chris Joppru (Utah) and Dennis Brown (Connecticut) all visited Pittsburgh but for various reasons went in different directions.
You can’t keep everyone happy
Former Pitt assistant JD Brookhart signed 23 players for Akron on Letter of Intent Day including four 3-star prospects. The publisher of Ohio High magazine called Brookhart’s class the best in the MAC Conference. A few recruiting experts said Brookhart may have had a better class than a couple of Big Ten schools. So everybody in Akron is happy, right? Not exactly. A few Akron high school coaches including my friend Claude Brown at Akron Buchtel are complaining that too many scholarships were given to out-of-state kids. Akron signed 9 from Pennsylvania and 7 from other states (primarily Florida). It seems I have seen this movie before. The college coach is trying his best to win. The high school coach wants scholarship for the local kids. You can’t keep everyone happy.
Watch the Syracuse game with Pitt fans
DT_Pitt is trying to put together a group of Pitt fans to watch the Syracuse game at the Rock Bottom Restaurant in Homestead. Last year he had a large group and is trying to have an equally large turnout this year. See the top of the basketball board for details.
Rivals Radio
Keep in mind that if you are not able to listen to Rivals Radio live from 10:00 AM until Noon EST you may want to listen to “segments” which are archived on the Rivals Radio page.
Kudos to the computer folks
The Pantherlair and Rivals.com continue to grow at a very rapid pace. The hiring of Dave Wannstedt has reenergized the Pitt fan base. The Pantherlair had over 8.6 million page views in December and January. On Letter of Intent Day the Rivals network had almost 39 million page views. The system was able to handle the heavy volume. Congratulations to the system folks at Rivals.com.
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
Note to Pantherlair.com Fans: The staff at Pantherlair.com works diligently to bring you the best information on University of Pittsburgh football and basketball recruiting (in addition to game coverage). Thousands of Panther fans visit our site on a daily basis. We have received a tremendous amount of e-mail thanking us for our efforts. If you like our site, please feel free to tell other fans about it. “Spread the word” and let’s add to our online family of Panther fans.
