For coach Frank Solich and company, National Signing Day proved to be 'big' in more ways than one.
Solich and recruiting coordinator Brian Haines announced the addition of 24 football players to the Bobcats' roster at a press conference yesterday. The signing class is the largest for Ohio since 2005, when 27 players joined the squad.
Headlining the class is defensive lineman Antwan Crutcher from Glenville High School in Cleveland, a factory for top-tier football recruits. The class also features two players from Solon High School and a transfer from former quarterback Boo Jackson's junior college.
The recruits come from 10 states and the District of Columbia. Three are junior college or military academy transfers, and the rest are high school standouts. Fourteen of the signees will play defense with the other 10 contributing offensively. Seven members of the class were rated as three-star recruits on Scout.com.
I think this could be one of the better
if not the best class - I believe it is certainly on paper - that we've recruited so far Solich said.
I think everybody understands how important this day is in terms of what your program is going to be about in the future. There's no way that you can draw up X's and O's that are going to work without the players to get it done.
The largest component of the new class of Bobcats will battle in the trenches, as half of the two-dozen recruits are linemen. Haines said he knew recruiting up front would be critical after the team lost eight senior linemen.
I think we did well because the kids that we targeted are the kids that we got
he said.
Solich and Haines focused on the character of the recruits and their commitment to the team and university. They emphasized relationship building as an important component of the recruiting process.
Going into it
we knew we wanted to recruit good student-athletes with good character
Haines said. We targeted them
we wrote them
and we did everything that we could to do.
Attracting high-caliber talent is a must for a successful team, but adapting players to the team's style of play is another top priority, Solich said.
You want to identify those guys that are talented and really want to be at Ohio University
and then
when you get them here
you know what they're going to be all about
