Head coach Pat Fitzgerald likes to say that Northwestern's recruiting begins and ends in Chicago. This year, the Wildcats are off to a good start in proving him right.
Two of the three Northwestern 2023 commits hail from the Chicago suburbs. But the Wildcats would like to see that number grow significantly as the cycle progresses.
Rivals released its Illinois state rankings for 2023, and 11 of them are on Northwestern's radar. Two of them are commits, two others have gotten offers and seven other uncommitted prospects have received recruiting interest from the Wildcats.
You can be sure that those numbers will increase in the coming weeks and months. Last year, Northwestern offered seven of the Top 30 commits in Illinois, signing three of them (Reggie Fleurima, Deuce McGuire and Chris Petrucci), as well as a fourth Illinoisan who wasn't ranked (Jack Lausch).
Eleven of 30 is a percentage of 36.7%. That's a pretty high percentage given the fact that Northwestern's high academic standards rule out a great number of prospects every year.
Here's a list of the prospects on Northwestern's radar, in the order than they are ranked:
