The Free Press, Mankato, MN

Sports

Related Photos

  • courrier, chad.jpg

    courrier, chad.jpg

February 2, 2012

Courrier: A look at Minnesota State's football recruits

By Chad Courrier Free Press Staff Writer

Football signing day is often an unusual time.

Football staffs across America laud the ability of kids, who in most cases, won’t play for 1½ years.

It might be a better idea for football staffs to highlight the previous year’s recruiting class because those are the fellas you’ll be seeing on the field in the fall.

Given that, it’s also a good time to critique the incoming players because by the time they put on a game uniform, everyone will have forgotten these predictions.

The Mavericks brought on 18 players Wednesday, which is an unusually small number. Some of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference programs signed up more than 30 future players, but a small senior class didn’t allow Minnesota State coaches much money to be spend.

Neico Stokke, a quarterback from Menomonie, was named the offensive player of the year in Wisconsin. Surely, that would get him an offer or two from Division I programs, but they must have been scared off by Stokke’s height, listed at 6-foot-1. That’s plenty tall enough for a Division II program, where performance is more important than the measurables.

Running back is a key position at Minnesota State, where often times there was only one healthy player last season. Redshirt freshman Andy Pfeiffer bailed out his team with 1,229 yards last season, but you can’t count on any back staying healthy for all 12 games. That shines a spotlight on Tyler Parker of Mt. Voreb, Wis., who rushed for 1,750 yards and scored 36 touchdowns, 30 by rush, last season.

The Mavericks have stockpiled a good group of young offensive linemen, who really started to play well during the last half of the season. And the nucleus of that group comes from Omaha, Neb., where the Mavericks found 300-pounder James Andersen and Garrett Biebl, who will start as a tight end but with a few pounds will probably be moved to tackle.

Offensive lineman Luke Wendricks is the younger brother of Caleb Wendricks, who played well as a true freshman in the Mavericks’ defensive line last season. If bloodlines mean anything, this is a solid “get.”

The Mavericks also lacked depth at receiver, which was addressed in recruiting. Brent Esser of Wausau, Wis., is an undersized burner, while Connor McKeen of Woodbury is a longer, bigger target. And everyone in town knows how productive Mankato West’s Hunter Friesen can be.

Defensively, Marcus Gooden of Elk Grove Village is listed as a linebacker but will probably start out at safety. He’s fast, and the video clips shown Wednesday show great speed, though no coach in America shows film of one of the recruits tripping over a yard line.

It’s easy to get excited about a recruiting class, even though you’ll forget almost every name until you see them playing in 2013. However, the Mavericks have a lot of young talent returning next season, and some of these kids could fill the missing pieces on a championship team.

Chad Courrier is a Free Press staff writer. To contact him, call 507-344-6353 or e-mail at ccourrier@mankatofreepress.com or check out his local sports blog at www.mankatofreepress.com.

Text Only | Photo Reprints
Sports