A phenomenon that has never included Oregon is occurring before our eyes due to recruiting skills of Coach Mario Cristobal and his staff, and I was stunned at the recent numbers illustrating this trend. It has a profound impact on the future of the conference and begins to beg the question of “whether the Pac-12 is becoming the ACC of the West?”
My friends, when I was released from site responsibilities–I had no idea that such a pent-up-writer within me would emerge. This is the sixth article in seven days, and not many of these were planned; I just had things to say and I’m having a blast just being a writer again!
Well that, and getting a kick from looking at recruiting results versus the rest of the conference. As usual, USC does extremely well and almost always does, yet Oregon has broken a recruiting ceiling that might wake up other ADs around the conference when they hire coaches. They will need to or be buried in the very near future as they will watch every Pac-12 Championship contested by the Ducks and Trojans.
My rankings come from Rivals.com, whom I prefer and you can learn why right here. This is stunning recruiting momentum over a three-year period that I suspected was taking place, but not to this degree for Oregon.
The Califlock impact on prior recruiting classes has been quite REAL for the Ducks.
Team Total Number of 4/5-Star Players Signed in 2019, 2020 and 2021
Oregon 45
Washington 30
USC 29
Arizona State 15
Stanford 14
UCLA 10
Utah 10
Cal 7
Colorado 6
Washington State 2
Oregon State 1
Arizona 1
Addendum:
While the Huskies only had six of the 4/5-Star players signed in 2021, they had 24 signed under Chris Petersen the prior two years. USC did superbly last year with 17 signed of the 4/5-Star players, but only had 12 total the two years before.
For the 2021 class, Oregon had 19 and USC had 17 of the 4/5-Star players signed, while the rest of the conference only averaged signing 2.3 of the coveted players is all!
Thus far for the 2022 recruiting class, Oregon has nine of the 4/5-Star players verbally committed, USC has six verballed and the rest of the conference averages 2.1 of these most desired players among each of them. (Washington has three and Stanford has five, and yet it is still bad news for tiny-ten in the Pac-12 as an average in 2022 recruiting to date.)
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When I write my Op-Eds, I do Critical Analysis where I give grief when deserved, (like the Oregon offense) but also I give credit when due, as I see it. And Oregon’s head coach deserves an absolute ton of credit for what he is creating.
The talent gap is growing massively for 2021, and so far in 2022. Over the last three years of Coach Cristobal’s era, he has not achieved not a small lead in talent acquisition, but 50% more over the top two challengers? My gosh, he is killing it beyond what I could even imagine; I’m glad he’s on our side!
Mario Cristobal is creating victories on the field from his triumphs on the recruiting trail!
I had checked preliminary numbers prior to starting this article and was thinking that Oregon and USC were running away from the conference in recruiting as Texas and Oklahoma had done in the Big-12. I was wrong, as Oregon is already building a lead similar to what Clemson has in the ACC, and what the Pac-12 used to look like so many years ago with USC. It was the giant and the rest of us, but guess who has become a GREEN GIANT now in Pac-12 recruiting?
And it is not even close.
“Oh, how we love to ponder about the recruiting of Our Beloved Ducks!”
Charles Fischer (Mr. FishDuck)
Eugene, Oregon
Top Photo by Oregon Football Twitter
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Charles Fischer has been an intense fan of the Ducks, a season ticket holder at Autzen Stadium for 38 years and has written reports on football boards for over 26 years. Known as “FishDuck” on those boards, he is acknowledged for providing intense detail in his scrimmage reports, and in his Xs and Os play analyses. He is single, has a daughter Christine, and resides in Eugene Oregon where he was a Financial Advisor for 36 years.
He now focuses full-time on Charitable Planned Giving Workshops for churches and non-profit organizations in addition to managing his two Oregon Football Websites, of FishDuck.com and the Our Beloved Ducks forum. He is a busy man!
He does not profess to be a coach or analyst, but simply a “hack” that enjoys sharing what he has learned and invites others to correct or add to this body of Oregon Football! See More…