Early bird gets the QB
Class of 2019 quarterback Cale Millen committed to Northwestern on Sunday, Dec. 10, during an unofficial visit to Evanston.
The pledge may have seemed early to many people. After all, the three-star signal caller just completed his junior season at Snoqualmie (Wash.) Mount Si and has more than a year to go before he can sign his national letter of intent. He won’t take the field for Northwestern for nearly two years.
But the truth is, Millen’s commitment wasn’t that early. He’s a quarterback, and quarterbacks go fast in recruiting. Of the 35 ranked pro-style or dual-threat QBs in the 2019 class, 11 of them are already committed. That’s a little less than a third and it’s not even 2018 yet.
So, why is that? Why do quarterbacks commit so early in the process?
Really, it has to do with a couple things. For one, quarterback is rightfully regarded as the most critical position in football, so it would make sense for schools to emphasize it. Then, you add the fact that just about every program in the country is looking for one every year and it creates a feeding frenzy in a recruiting world that can already be considered dog-eat-dog. Coaches figure that they’d better get their guy early before someone else does.
Plus, a nice byproduct is that a quarterback is typically a guy you can build a class around. Get your high-profile quarterback early and others will follow him.
“The quarterback position is the most important in almost every class, so securing your guy early not only gives you relief knowing that position is taken care of, but it is also the springboard from which to build the rest of your class,” said Rivals Midwest recruiting expert Josh Helmholdt. “Offensive skill players want to know who is going to be getting them the football and other position groups are comforted knowing the all-important QB position. It is also important to secure a QB early because the talent pool dries up quickly as every team attacks that position first.”
Northwestern can now breathe a little easier because it already has the quarterback it wants for 2019.
The Wildcats’ 2018 class was eerily similar to 2019 when it comes to the quarterback position. Exactly one year before Millen’s commitment, on Dec. 10, 2016, three-star quarterback Jason Whittaker of Rockford (Mich.) committed to Northwestern to become the first member of the Wildcats’ 2018 class. (Millen is the second pledge this year, beaten to the punch by linebacker Bryce Gallagher, younger brother of current NU freshman linebacker Blake Gallagher.)
That’s the way Northwestern’s director of player personnel Chris Bowers likes it. He doesn’t want to strike out early and get left holding the bag when it comes to quarterbacks.
"Tracking it for the last few years, it’s been pretty clear that by January of a prospect's junior year, 12-15 QBs are committed (nationwide),” said Bowers, who is not permitted by NCAA rules to talk about individual recruits before they sign but agreed to talk about the recruiting process with WildcatReport. “You can debate that they are the top 12-15 in the nation, or at least fall in the top 25-30. That means potentially half of the guys we would want are off the board, so if we don’t work ahead we could find ourselves in a challenging situation.”
So Northwestern gets to work early on identifying its quarterback targets for each class. Even though head coach Pat Fitzgerald has the final say regarding any offers, Bowers says that the Wildcats won’t offer a quarterback until offensive coordinator Mick McCall sees the prospect throw in person. That only adds to the time crunch and makes early identification that much more important.
"QB recruiting tends to work a little differently than other positions for several reasons,” said Bowers. “First, the position is so critical. It’s really hard to win at any level without a really good QB that fits your system.
“Second, in recruiting, you are generally looking at each team taking one. Since 2011 we have taken one in every class and didn’t take one in 2012, I believe. So in big-time college football, the Power Five conferences, that leaves you 64 scholarships a class. You can narrow that further when you look at the systems: clearly Georgia Tech and Washington State run different systems (than we do).”
And missing on a quarterback who winds up committing to another school means the numbers game can quickly turn against you.
"It gets a little dicey when things speed up,” said Bowers. “We absolutely have to do our research. It’s a critical position and we are only taking one. So we have to be thorough, but we have to be efficient and decisive.”
The Wildcats managed to land one of their A-list quarterbacks in each of their last two classes. However, the three previous years they had to move to Plan B for various reasons.
In the 2015 class, Northwestern landed Lloyd Yates, a project QB from Oak Park (Ill.) River Forest who has since moved to wide receiver. They took Yates after missing on Jason Pellerin, a Louisianan who looked to be ready to commit after a Northwestern visit before Ole Miss came in with an offer and snatched him. (NU was also briefly in the hunt for Sam Darnold that year before his popularity soared.)
In the 2016 recruiting cycle, the Wildcats in March landed Deuce Wallace, their No. 1 guy, as the first member of the class and appeared to be set. But Wallace decommitted just a month later to pledge home-state Vanderbilt, throwing a wrench into NU’s plans. Targets Joshua Jackson and Anthony Brown committed to Virginia Tech and Boston College, respectively, so Northwestern wound up offering and getting a commitment from Aidan Smith in June.
For the 2017 class, the Wildcats missed on Jack Coan (Wisconsin) and Kasim Hill (Maryland) but felt fortunate in April to land Andrew Marty, a prospect who missed his junior year with an injury and was therefore under recruited.
Three-year starter Clayton Thorson, a four-star prospect in 2014, has one more year of eligibility left at Northwestern, assuming he doesn’t decide to leave early for the NFL draft this spring. So in 2019 all of those quarterbacks – Smith, Marty, Whittaker and perhaps even Millen, who will be a true freshman – will battle for the starting job.
Only then will Northwestern’s coaches know exactly how well they recruited the position.