In the wacky world of recruiting, Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh sleeping over at a prospect\u2019s house somehow makes perfect sense.<\/p>\n
Just ask Gerry DiNardo, who used to coach in the Big Ten himself.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe felt like whatever we could do to distinguish ourselves within the rules, we would do,\u201d DiNardo said. \u201cI was all for the gimmicks. I think they\u2019re effective. I think the only difference now is everybody knows what\u2019s going on because of social media.\u201d<\/p>\n
If Twitter had existed 20 years ago, maybe DiNardo could have been the football coach going viral. Instead, it\u2019s Harbaugh who has made waves over the past month for his unorthodox approach to recruiting, and he\u2019s just one example of the intensity and creativity that big-time programs show in the hypercompetitive weeks leading into signing day.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s gotten crazy, of course,\u201d said Donald Chumley, who coaches one of the nation\u2019s top prospects at Savannah Christian Prep in Georgia. \u201cEverybody\u2019s trying to make that last impression.\u201d<\/p>\n
Demetris Robertson of Savannah Christian is the No. 8 prospect in the country according to Rivals. With his recruitment coming down to the wire, Notre Dame caused a stir by sending a truck to Georgia in an effort to impress him. Chumley said he saw the massive vehicle \u2014 practically a billboard on wheels for Notre Dame football \u2014 at school.<\/p>\n
Chumley says all this attention can be a positive if players keep it in perspective. For recruits who are under a lot of pressure, it\u2019s nice to be able to have fun with the process.<\/p>\n
Harbaugh, who has rarely shied away from the spotlight since taking over as Michigan\u2019s coach about 13 months ago, recently spent the night at the house of Quinn Nordin, a top kicking prospect from Rockford H.S. in Michigan.<\/p>\n
Nordin told MLive.com that Harbaugh arrived just after midnight.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe slept in the guest room at our house,\u201d Nordin said. \u201cI was in my pajamas laughing when he showed up at the door. I couldn\u2019t believe it. There were fans in the street.\u201d<\/p>\n
Harbaugh may offer more details about that tactic at signing day Wednesday, especially if Nordin ends up at Michigan, but until the letters of intent are signed, college coaches aren\u2019t allowed to say much about players they\u2019re recruiting. Still, information about who is recruiting whom \u2014 and how \u2014 isn\u2019t hard to find, especially now that players can post pictures and videos on social media.<\/p>\n
So there\u2019s value in these types of stunts. A coach can\u2019t come out and announce who he\u2019s recruiting, but if he acts in a way that will draw attention on Twitter, suddenly there\u2019s additional buzz for his program.<\/p>\n
\u201cMore coaches are doing things they know can and will go viral because it\u2019s great advertisement,\u201d said Mike Bellotti, the former Oregon coach who is now an ESPN analyst. \u201cThe other thing is that at one point, coaches could rely on their football accomplishments and the strength of their program and all of those things. Now there\u2019s a little bit of a kickback to be more personable, to be more \u2018with it\u2019 \u2014 to relate to the athlete better.\u201d<\/p>\n
DiNardo coached at Vanderbilt, LSU and Indiana and is now an analyst for the Big Ten Network. He recalled the time he was recruiting a linebacker named Carlton Hall to Vandy, and he couldn\u2019t go into Hall\u2019s house because of NCAA rules.<\/p>\n
So he stayed by the curb and visited from there.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had burned my home visit early in recruiting,\u201d DiNardo said. \u201cSo I got a speaker phone, and I had the assistant coach go into the house, reorganize the furniture and put the kitchen table by the kitchen window. I parked on the sidewalk. I had my cellphone, and the assistant coach was in the house because he was allowed to be there more than once. So I conducted my second home visit from the curb.\u201d<\/p>\n
The idea is to show players how important they are to your school. Handwritten notes are another tactic, and DiNardo had a system.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would put 10 names on the greaseboard in the morning before the staff room,\u201d he said. \u201cEvery coach had to write a handwritten note to those 10 people before they left the staff room. So we basically had about 100 handwritten notes. … So a prospect could very well get 10-15 notes from us in one day, handwritten notes.\u201d<\/p>\n
DiNardo did have to amend that strategy in one respect.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had one coach who couldn\u2019t spell,\u201d DiNardo said. \u201cI had to stop him from writing handwritten notes.\u201d<\/p>\n
The No. 1 recruit in the country right now, according to several rankings, is Rashan Gary, a defensive lineman from New Jersey. Needless to say, he\u2019s had a lot to think about lately.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s getting crazy,\u201d he said recently. \u201cA lot of college coaches are trying to get back into the fight. It\u2019s just me and my mom, me and my family handling it. It\u2019s getting crazy but I\u2019m enjoying it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clemson recently gave Gary\u2019s mother a cake. Every little gesture can help.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a competition,\u201d Bellotti said. \u201cPeople forget coaches are competitive at everything. You never want to lose. You don\u2019t want to lose a recruit, you don\u2019t want to lose a battle.\u201d<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP Sports Writer Steve Megargee and College Football Writer Ralph D. Russo contributed to this report.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP college football website: collegefootball.ap.org<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the wacky world of recruiting, Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh sleeping over at a prospect\u2019s house somehow makes perfect sense. Just ask Gerry DiNardo, who used to coach in the Big Ten himself. \u201cWe felt like whatever we could do to distinguish ourselves within the rules, we would do,\u201d DiNardo said. \u201cI was all for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-33385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33385\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33385"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=33385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}