Recruiting, OOC, and the Future After a Bad Loss

[MrCraig]

I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and I think the day after one of App’s worst losses ever is a good time to bring it up.

There has been some discussion on this message board and amongst the App State faithful about how our beloved team, when presented with a huge opportunity to do some football world shaking, always seems to fall flat on their face.This isn’t necessarily something I want to talk about in this post. Instead I want to talk about the major opportunities that are coming up for our Mountaineers.

Take a look at our out-of-conference opponents over the next four years. We will play 5 games against North Carolina, South Carolina, East Carolina, and Wake Forest, and one of those UNC games is at home. Consider what will happen to our school and football program if we can just win 2 of those games and keep the other 3 losses respectable. With the trajectory that Satterfield and Co. have this team on, I don’t think it’s crazy to say we can take some combination of two wins from UNC, ECU, or WF. I believe that would be an immense boost to our recruiting base and football program as a whole. If you are a low 4- or high 3-star prospect in North or South Carolina, App might quickly become a much more interesting landing spot for your talent.This would then lead to more talent coming into the program, which would then lead to more wins and taking advantage of those big opportunities that we keep seeming to miss.

Compare our OOC schedule to those of the other comparable teams in the Sun Belt. The big names for Troy, in my opinion, are Southern Miss and NC State at home, but NC State really isn’t in their recruiting footprint. Arkansas State has Georgia, UNLV, SMU, and Memphis on the schedule, but only SMU and one Memphis matchup are at home. And again, I would only consider Memphis and maybe SMU to be in their recruiting zone. Then there’s Georgia Southern. They have some big names coming up. Boise State, FAU, LSU, Arkansas, Nebraska, Ole Miss, and UAB. However, all of those games except one FAU match-up are on the road. Sure, Arkansas, LSU, and Ole Miss are some great money games, but I don’t believe those games are winnable or would help much with recruiting. Like the others, only FAU is really even close to Southern’s typical recruiting area. We seem to be the only team playing multiple games within our state and our recruiting footprint, and that are very winnable. If Southern was playing Georgia and Georgia Tech in Statesboro, or Arkansas St. was playing Arkansas and Mississippi State, it might be different.

The point I’m trying to make is, we have a major football first world problem. Our Mountaineers are in the midst of the most successful transition from FCS to FBS in the history of college football, but we want more. We want to be the best, because we’ve been the best before. While last night’s loss will sting for a long time, if we look at the long term picture for our team, the future is quite bright.

[Rick83]

Absolutely, and don't forget we're playing with the 3rd youngest team in FBS, and with Jalin out now maybe the youngest. The future looks bright for sure, but we can still win the SBC this year and another bowl game.

[MountaineerChemist10]

This loss will definitely fire up our players for the rest of the season. Especially when we play Troy for a shot at SBC. Next season will definitely be OUR year; imagine winning over UNC, South Carolina & revenge over Georgia Southern. Can't wait!

[App91]

A loss like this affects everything from recruiting to perception in future rankings and votes. We had a "reluctant" ranking and took it and got boat raced. We could not handle it and it showed, we were not prepared for the moment. Next time in a similar position, this will be pointed toward. Its a shame since what it could have done for our university, area, not to mention other athletics teams-forget about the additional dollars. It will be very difficult to overcome the perception this causes.