Blue White Illustrated

O f the eight recruiting classes that Penn State has signed since James Franklin took over the program in January 2014, this year's is the 8rst to 8nish outside of the top 25 in the Rivals.com team rankings. When you consider that the Nittany Lions signed only 16 players in their Class of 2021, and that Franklin missed out on two of his most prized in-state recruiting targets – 8ve-star o9ensive tackle Nolan Rucci of Lititz and four- star safety Derrick Davis Jr. of Mon- roeville – it's not hard to understand why this group 8nished 26th in the country. When a recruiting class has only 16 members, it's almost impossible for it to end up being ranked highly by Rivals un- less it's stacked with four- and 8ve-star signees. The best example of that kind of outlier class is Oklahoma's 2021 contin- gent. Like Penn State, the Sooners signed only 16 prospects in the 2021 re- cruiting cycle, but they still ended up 13th nationally thanks to the presence of three 8ve-star, eight four-star and 8ve three-star signees. The average star rat- ing of Oklahoma's incoming players is 3.88. Of the 16 players in Penn State's class, seven earned four-star ratings, while the remaining nine players all received three stars. That works out to an average rat- ing of 3.44 stars per player. When you look at the average star ratings, Penn State's latest class is quite comparable to its immediate predecessor. The Nittany Lions signed 27 players in 2020, with 13 receiving four-star status and the remaining 13 all earning three stars, for an average rating of 3.48 stars per player. That class finished 15th in the Rivals rank- ings. So the reason for the discrepancy between the rankings of the 2020 and 2021 classes is that the former had 12 more players than the latter. It's not because of the individual rankings of each player. All those numbers are subjective and are determined by the individuals mak- ing the evaluations. In addition, one very important part of the recruiting process that gets overlooked by college football fans is how well teams address their anticipated needs with their re- cruiting classes. That's ultimately what matters most. Keeping that in mind, let's take a posi- tion-by-position look at how Penn State addressed its recruiting needs with its Class of 2021. We'll evaluate the o9en- sive recruits this month and take a look at the defense and special teams in our next issue. QUARTERBACK SIGNEE Christian Veilleux ANALYSIS Fi;h-year senior Sean Clif- ford will be back as Penn State's starter at QB for the 2021 season. It will be his PHIL'S CORNER Though small in size, class will help Penn State meet needs on offense The Big Ten earlier this month revamped the 2021 football schedule for every team in the conference, although the changes were modest. For the Nittany Lions, those changes amounted to a reshu:ing of six dates. They are as follows: • The Indiana game, originally slated for Oct. 30 at Beaver Stadium, has been moved to Oct. 2. The venue has not changed. • Penn State's bye weekend has been moved to Oct. 16. • Instead of an Oct. 16 meeting with Illinois at Beaver Stadium, the Illini will visit on Oct. 23. • Penn State's trip to Ohio State has been moved from Nov. 20 to Oct. 30 • The Nittany Lions' home game against Rutgers, which was originally scheduled for Nov. 27, will now take place on Nov. 20 at Beaver Stadium. • Michigan State takes its familiar place at the end of Penn State's schedule, with the Lions traveling to East Lansing on Nov. 27. The game had originally been scheduled for Oct. 20 at Spartan Stadium. ■ SEPTEMBER 4 at Wisconsin 11 Ball State 18 Auburn 25 Villanova OCTOBER 2 Indiana 9 at Iowa 16 bye week 23 Illinois 30 at Ohio State NOVEMBER 6 at Maryland 13 Michigan 20 Rutgers 27 at Michigan State P S U S C H E D U L E Big Ten adjusts 2021 football slates

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