Friday, November 06, 2009
Maybe time to reassess VT, UVa recruiting in Florida
Florida kids instrumental in Duke turnaround
Doug Doughty
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When Virginia and Virginia Tech scaled back their recruiting of Florida earlier this decade, it made a lot of sense to me.
The Hokies felt as if they were spending too much time babysitting. The final straw may have been their recruitment of Sanford, Fla., defensive lineman Budd Thacker, the son of ex-Hokies linebacker Doug Thacker from Roanoke.
If a player commits to an out-of-state school and then one of the state’s big three programs (Florida, Florida State and Miami) gets involved, it’s going to be difficult for the out-of-state school to keep him.
As soon as Thacker selected Tech, it was almost a signal for Florida State to get involved and that’s where he ended up.
In recent years, Tech’s recruiting philosophy has been geared more toward those prospects who live within a six hours’ drive of Blacksburg, players whose parents can see them play without great difficulty.
In Virginia’s case, the Cavaliers simply weren’t getting the kind of quality prospects that they were attracting elsewhere (mostly New Jersey in coach Al Groh’s early years). But, with Groh almost certain to lose his job at the end of the season, is it time to revisit that strategy?
My buddy, Gene McBurney, is an Ole Miss fan and alumnus who pays attention to Virginia football because his daughter is a UVa student. He thinks that former Ole Miss and Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville would be a good choice as Groh’s successor. McBurney says that whoever Virginia picks, the coach needs to be somebody who can recruit Florida.
I’m not sure that Tuberville would be the best choice and, at first, I didn’t agree with McBurney on the subject of Florida recruiting. But then Duke came to Scott Stadium last Saturday with five offensive starters from Florida and whipped the Cavaliers 28-17.
Two of those starters, wide receivers Donovan Varner and Conner Vernon, each had seven receptions and more than 100 receiving yards. Varner and Vernon are graduates of Gulliver Prep in Coral Gables, Fla.
Know what? The coach at Gulliver Prep is Earl Sims -- the former Virginia linebacker Earl Sims -- who played on Groh’s first UVa team in 2001 and is best known for stripping a ball from a University of Richmond receiver and preserving Groh’s first Cavalier victory, 17-16.
Of course, Miami-bred senior quarterback Thaddeus Lewis is Duke’s leader and star. Another Floridian, Riley Skinner from Jacksonville, led Wake Forest to the 2006 championship and has more wins as a starter than any quarterback in Deacons’ history.
“I recruited the Broward-Dade-West Palm Beach for about 14 years,” said Duke coach David Cutcliffe, who has other coaches with ties to the central Florida and Panhandle areas. “We like to go down there and you find those right kids that are just fiercely competitive.
“Everyone knows the numbers of players that come out of the state of Florida, but I’ve always been kind of choosy about who I like down there and, when we find one we like, we go after him hard.
“There’s always going to be a good pool and that’s why we’re going to continue to go there. The best way I can say it as an old Alabama boy is, ‘When you’re fishing out of a good pond, don’t go try and find another one if you’re catching fish.’ “
Virginia Tech currently has two players from Florida on its roster, freshman defensive back and kick returner Jayron Hosley and redshirt freshman defensive tackle Dwight Tucker. They have taken a commitment from one of Hosley’s teammates from Delray Beach, Fla., quarterback Mark Leal.
Virginia’s lone Floridians are place-kicker Robert Randolph, who is a walk-on, and reserve defensive back Mike Parker and freshman tight end Paul Freedman. The Cavaliers have taken a commitment from Miami-based defensive back and wide receiver Pablo Alvarez.
“There’s a lot of good football played in Florida and certain areas have some very strong academic circumstances,” Groh said. “When we came here, there were a lot of players from Florida on the roster and there wasn’t one of them you would have recruited if they were in town.
“None of them were of the quality that should be playing in this conference. So, kind of with that as a starter, that directed us away from [Florida recruiting] a little bit. We wanted to give substantial effort to in-state players, but we did continue to make some effort in that area.
“As time went on, we have started to look for the same type of player wherever that might be, whether it’s [defensive end] Matt Conrath out of Chicago or Paul Freedman out of Florida or Jake Snyder out of Richmond.”
A lot of the strategy depends on a staff’s background and whether assistants (or the head coach, like Cutcliffe) has recruited in Florida.
“Obviously, it’s hard to say you’re going to recruit the state of Florida unless you put five or six people in there actively and we think that would take us too far us away from our base,” Groh said.
“But, if you have some people who know where to go and have a specific background, that helps. There are a lot of fish in that sea and you’ve got to know where to drop your hook.”
