[socalstanfan1]

I for one cannot wait to see what Coach Akina does with all the DB talent from last years class, and if all goes well, with this year's class.  I suspect that Akina being around might have played a part in Lyons' decision to return for a 5th year.  If you have had a bit of an uneven career up to this point, why not take an opportunity to work for another year with a coach acknowledged as one of the best in the nation at his job.

Regarding our recruiting ranking, I haven't looked too closely at where ESPN has us right now, but I did look at their top 300 and several of the guys we are waiting on are on that list: Buncom (#186) Love (#215).  I don't suppose we have any chance with Equinimeous St. Brown (#63), do we? His background seems to make him such a great fit for us, I still hold out some hope that he could be a sleeper. I don't put much stock in ESPN's player rankings, but picking up a couple of their top-300 might get us into their top-25.

But I do think that it makes more sense to look at the average ranking of players in a recruiting class, rather than the overall team recruiting ranking.  I think that due to the high number of our players who stay the full four years (without dropping out for academic reasons or heading to the NFL at the first opportunity) we will often have classes a bit smaller than other schools.  So as long as our average of all our players is high, I will be satisfied.  So on Rivals we are the 9th best team in the Pac-12 right now, but if you look at our average stars/player we are #4 (and that is before adding, hopefully, three 4-star players in Buncom, Meeks, Love.) I can be quite satisfied with that. 

[socalstanfan1]

I for one cannot wait to see what Coach Akina does with all the DB talent from last years class, and if all goes well, with this year's class.  I suspect that Akina being around might have played a part in Lyons' decision to return for a 5th year.  If you have had a bit of an uneven career up to this point, why not take an opportunity to work for another year with a coach acknowledged as one of the best in the nation at his job.

Regarding our recruiting ranking, I haven't looked too closely at where ESPN has us right now, but I did look at their top 300 and several of the guys we are waiting on are on that list: Buncom (#186) Love (#215).  I don't suppose we have any chance with Equinimeous St. Brown (#63), do we? His background seems to make him such a great fit for us, I still hold out some hope that he could be a sleeper. I don't put much stock in ESPN's player rankings, but picking up a couple of their top-300 might get us into their top-25.

But I do think that it makes more sense to look at the average ranking of players in a recruiting class, rather than the overall team recruiting ranking.  I think that due to the high number of our players who stay the full four years (without dropping out for academic reasons or heading to the NFL at the first opportunity) we will often have classes a bit smaller than other schools.  So as long as our average of all our players is high, I will be satisfied.  So on Rivals we are the 9th best team in the Pac-12 right now, but if you look at our average stars/player we are #4 (and that is before adding, hopefully, three 4-star players in Buncom, Meeks, Love.) I can be quite satisfied with that.