quote:
BTW, that talent differential at Boise State over its conference foes wasn’t nearly as big an advantage as it has been made out to here. Using the 2017 rankings as an anecdotal example, BSU racked up 167 points in the 247 rankings, while the worst-recruiting school in the Mountain West that year, New Mexico, managed just under 110, a difference of 57 points.

From 2016-2020 Boise State averaged the #62 class. The next highest average over that period was San Diego State at #85.

Boise recruited like a bottom tier P5 school while the rest of the MWC recruited like Sun Belt schools. And Boise had the best classes every single season while other schools had a "good" year then a bad year.

It isn't a slight, Harsin had the best players and they did what they were supposed to do - they dominated the league. He's a good football coach.

Boise State is basically an upper tier American Athletic Conference program playing in the Sun Belt.

This post was edited on 7/12/21 at 1:36 pm

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Posted by SummerOfGeorge

Member since Jul 2013

102699 posts

Posted on 7/12/21 at 1:44 pm to SummerOfGeorge

Per the 2020 Team Talent Ranking by 247 (the 2020 roster broken down by recruiting ranks), Boise State had the 4th most talented roster in non-P5. The 3 teams ahead of them were AAC teams.

1. Cincinnati (84.39) (AAC)
2. UCF (84.12) (AAC)
3. Houston (83.66) (AAC)
4. Boise State (83.44) (MWC)
5. USF (83.38) (AAC)
6. Memphis (83.35) (AAC)
7. Florida Atlantic (83.32) (CUSA)
8. SMU (82.97) (AAC)
9. Louisiana Tech (82.57) (CUSA)
10. Florida International (82.52) (CUSA)
11. East Carolina (82.41) (AAC)
12. Colorado State (82.22) (MWC)
13. Tulane (82.14) (AAC)
14. UTSA (82.04) (CUSA)
15. North Texas (81.87) (CUSA)
16. BYU (81.81) (Independent)

Boise State really should be in the American. That'd be a really good addition for that league - in football and basketball. With the playoff expansion coming up, I'm guessing that league champion would almost always make the playoffs as long as they had 2 or fewer losses. Cincinnati, UCF, Houston, Boise State, Memphis, SMU.....that's some good football.

This post was edited on 7/12/21 at 1:47 pm

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Posted by FearlessFreep

Baja Alabama

Member since Nov 2009

17357 posts

Posted on 7/12/21 at 1:51 pm to SummerOfGeorge

quote:
From 2016-2020 Boise State averaged the #62 class. The next highest average over that period was San Diego State at #85.

Again, once you get out of the top 10-15, those differences are far less significant.

Using 2017 as a guide (since I’ve still got the tab open in my browser), the difference between the #62 class and the #85 class was 33 points. In comparison, the difference between the #4 class that year (USC) and the #27 class (Arky) was 86 points, a much larger talent gap. And I deliberately didn’t use Bama’s insane #1 class that year, because it was an outlier at 323 points - which was over 100 points higher than the school 23 slots below them (Mississippi State).

I get your point, and realize that Harsin will have a much tougher row to hoe up against the upper echelons of the SEC than he did at BSU - but to compare his recruiting advantages there to Bama (or UGa or LSU) over its conference competition is wholly inaccurate.

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