By Chris Williams, CycloneFanatic.com Publisher
Today reminded me of one of my favorite George Strait songs.
Easy come. Easy go.
There wasn’t much drama surrounding National Signing Day 2011 for Paul Rhoads and his Iowa State program. The guys who you thought would sign did.
As for surprises…Well, there weren’t any. That’s not a bad thing either. No, some headline JUCO who is a sure thing to start didn’t appear on Cyclones.com’s Signing Day Central page out of nowhere.
But as far as we know, none of Iowa State’s 2011 commitments got poached either.
“As I’ve always said in recruiting, its not those that you don’t get that hurt you,” said head coach Paul Rhaods. “Its those that you do get that don’t pan out. Our staff continues to do an outstanding job of evaluating talent. We’ve put together another class that we are extremely pleased with.”
CLICK HERE for the Class of 2011 by state, position & bios
QUICK HITS
– After today’s press conference, I had a chance to sit down and chat with Iowa State running backs coach Ken Pope. Here an interesting tidbit for you regarding Robert Standard. His father trained Standard to be a “prize fighter” from a young age. Pope credits Standard’s outstanding vision and foot work to that training background. I’ll have more on this in a future story here at CycloneFanatic.com.
– Are you one of those fans who is freaking out about Iowa State’s defensive line recruiting? This quote from Paul Rhoads should somewhat put your mind at ease.
“We establish numbers and needs at every single position group. It is very systematic,” Rhoads said about his recruiting method. “As we look at the numbers that we currently have on scholarship at the close of the 2010 season or about a year and a half before when we know what they are going to be, we start to assess what our needs are and how many at each position we want. Then we identify them and evaluate them and secure them. That’s where we ended up with this class. We are very close to all of those numbers at every position. Some people might panic saying ‘you’re low here or you’re high here.’ In truth, we are about right on the money with the numbers we want at every position group.”
– For the second year in a row, former West Des Moines Valley star Nick Kron was on Iowa State’s signee list. Kron was a gray shirt last year. He’ll technically be a freshman this fall. Add Kron and Rony Nelson (who was also in the 2010 class but redshirted last season), there are two more defensive linemen who will be added to Iowa State’s arsenal in 2011.
– Today’s is Paul Rhoads’ birthday. Happy birthday coach!
Cyclones missed on Grady, Johnson & Green
Three prospects that I thought Iowa State had at least a shot at landing today went other places today.
Florida quarterback prospect Joshua Grady chose Vanderbilt over Iowa State, South Florida and Wake Forest.
Another Florida prospect, offensive lineman Kaleb Johnson signed with Rutgers over offers from Iowa State, Miami, Louisville and North Carolina.
Then there was the JUCO defensive line prospect that the Cyclone Nation was holding its collective breath for in Louvan Green. He chose the mighty UNLV Rebels over Iowa State and Washington State.
Heading into the day, I considered Grady and Johnson somewhat long shots. I thought that Green’s situation was around 50-50. Missing out on any of these three doesn’t equal the end of the world for Iowa State football. However, any of these prospects would have been a nice little cherry on top of a this class.
Check out CycloneFanatic.com throughout the rest of this week for coverage of the 2011 Iowa State recruiting class and much more.
