Post-late signing day I'm not expecting any more movement so here are what should be my final rankings:
I rank Purdue 9th in class points, up from 14th last year and tying our 2020 rank. Thanks to getting a couple 4-star guys on signing day Nebraska jumped us in average stars per player to put us in 12th place, although there is a pretty razor-thin margin from 13th through 8th, so I think the exact placing for those programs doesn't really matter. Not to mention those are basically all West programs, so Purdue is recruiting at about the same level as its most common opponents. Purdue's average rating is a bit top-heavy with Brady Allen, Joe Strickland, and now Nic Caraway which benefits us in my Projected Draft Picks stat. Purdue ranks 9th in that.
So overall, I'd say Purdue ranks somewhere around 9th in the conference, which is fine. This is actually kind of a bizarre year with Indiana and Rutgers having extremely good classes which I don't think will continue, at least not at this level. But for Purdue we've seen similar-ish class rankings in 3 of the last 4 years, last year being the underwhelming class that was maybe impacted by COVID. I think we can expect this kind of class going forward: Decent depth at most positions, but a top-heavy class with guys who are hopefully immediate-impact guys.
Some quick thoughts on each class, going in order of projected draft picks because why not:
I rank Purdue 9th in class points, up from 14th last year and tying our 2020 rank. Thanks to getting a couple 4-star guys on signing day Nebraska jumped us in average stars per player to put us in 12th place, although there is a pretty razor-thin margin from 13th through 8th, so I think the exact placing for those programs doesn't really matter. Not to mention those are basically all West programs, so Purdue is recruiting at about the same level as its most common opponents. Purdue's average rating is a bit top-heavy with Brady Allen, Joe Strickland, and now Nic Caraway which benefits us in my Projected Draft Picks stat. Purdue ranks 9th in that.
So overall, I'd say Purdue ranks somewhere around 9th in the conference, which is fine. This is actually kind of a bizarre year with Indiana and Rutgers having extremely good classes which I don't think will continue, at least not at this level. But for Purdue we've seen similar-ish class rankings in 3 of the last 4 years, last year being the underwhelming class that was maybe impacted by COVID. I think we can expect this kind of class going forward: Decent depth at most positions, but a top-heavy class with guys who are hopefully immediate-impact guys.
Some quick thoughts on each class, going in order of projected draft picks because why not:
- Ohio State - Distant 1st place for the 11th year in a row, out of 11 years I have data on. There's nothing to deep dive into, they're the best class.
- Penn State - They're a very rich man's Purdue where they have a solid base for the class but with 3 huge stand-outs at the top. Just, you know, every recruit is half a star higher than Purdue.
- Michigan - The last 4 years have been almost identical classes for Harbaugh: Obviously a highly-rated class compared to the rest of the Big Ten, but wins very few recruiting battles against the Ohio States and Alabamas of the college football world. And with a bungled off-season I'm not sure that's changing, but a Michigan offer will usually trump an offer from 11 of the other Big Ten programs, so here they are at 3rd.
- Iowa - Iowa is usually pretty consistent in recruiting, but they got a major assist this year thanks to there being two in-state studs, which Iowa as a state is not really known for producing near-5-star guys. But Iowa was able to keep them home and away from the Cyclones who went into this season with a lot of hype.
- Indiana - I've posted before how I think a lot of this class is a paper tiger, but this is still without a doubt IU's best recruiting class ever. Let's see how 2023 looks following an on-the-field meltdown in 2021.
- Maryland - Coming off of a big bowl win and yet another round of signing day surprises Maryland might be a team to look out for next year. They were able to get a 4-star QB to reclassify to 2022 as well.
- Wisconsin - The first notable decline in average stars per player since 2018, and honestly Wisconsin is kind of lucky. Like Iowa they were able to land some stud in-state players in a state that normally doesn't produce too many. If those kids' parents moved to Florida 15 years ago this would probably be a pretty bad class for Wisconsin.
- Minnesota - They perform well in my projected draft picks metric because they've lately been pumping 3-star guys into the NFL, but this was actually an on-paper step back for Minnesota from recent classes in basically every metric. They actually finished second-to-last in class points and average rating per player.
- Purdue - Safely Purdue's second-best class behind only 2019. Allen and Caraway are the 3rd and 4th highest rated players in these 11 years, with Strickland being 9th. 2 out of the top 4, and 3 out of the top 9 for the program is a pretty great class.
- Michigan State - They are the inverse of Minnesota where they instead get hammered in this metric by signing a whole bunch of 4-stars who wound up busting. This is possibly their best class post-Dantonio-implosion and should be a force to be reckoned with going forward. Keep in mind they've established themselves as a major transfer portal destination as well, which doesn't show up in recruiting rankings.
- Rutgers - This is another team that's probably getting hammered in this metric a bit unfairly considering it uses the last several years of NFL draft data, and well, Rutgers was a dead program the last couple of years. This was a really good class for Rutgers, and managed to keep a lot of high-3-star and a couple 4-star New Jersey...ites in-state.
- Illinois - They signed 26 high schoolers, easily the most in the Big Ten, so they'll pop up as a decently-rated class in some metrics that might overvalue volume. We'll see how recruiting goes in 2023, but I was surprised to see Illinois not really get much of a new-coach-hype bump in 2022.
- Northwestern - Tied with Wisconsin for the least number of signees at 15. I'm guessing they're in a scholarship crunch because it's not like Northwestern is an easy school to transfer into. They're still scrambling for a QB somehow, although they did just get a Chicago suburbs kid for 2023.
- Nebraska - Some late commitments saved this class from being a complete disaster, but it's still well below Nebraska standards. And how could they really have gotten a much better class when everyone knows Frost is a dead man walking.
