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Recent progress helps football recruiting

By Jayson Jenks

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Behind recruiting coordinator Reggie Mitchell are two large projection screens — one on each side of the room. As Mitchell talks, the screens flash selected plays from each of Kansas’ 18 freshly signed recruits.

On the national signing day for high school recruits — a day usually filled with at least a few surprising twists — nothing unusual happened for the Jayhawks.

photo

Photo by Ryan Waggoner

The 18 players that had verbally committed to join coach Turner Gill did just that Wednesday. No new recruits were added.

Mitchell, the man charged with conducting much of that recruiting groundwork, appears to be a new face this season. After all, he joined Gill’s staff less than a month ago.

But in fact Mitchell is making his second tour at Kansas after working as an assistant from 1988-1996. He said recruiting this time around hardly compared with his previous experiences.

“When we first got here in 1988, it was broken,” Mitchell said. “If you look at the program now, I wouldn’t say it’s broken at all.”

Mitchell joined Kansas at a time when football stood in the shadow of the basketball program.

There were no football-specific offices or facilities, nothing really to serve as visual evidence that the football program intended to move forward.

Kansas’ 2010

recruiting class

* stars: 0

stars: 2

* stars: 12

stars: 4

Total Recruits: 18

Average Stars: 2.89

National Ranking: 56

Big 12 Conference

Recruiting Rankings:

  1. Texas
  2. Oklahoma
  3. Texas A&M
  4. Missouri
  5. Nebraska
  6. Oklahoma State
  7. Baylor
  8. Texas Tech
  9. Kansas
  10. Iowa State
  11. Kansas State
  12. Colorado

-Rivals.com

But on his first visit back to Lawrence, Mitchell walked through the Anderson Family Football Complex and understood for the first time just how much progress the program had made.

“I think it’s one of the best kept secrets,” Mitchell said. “When I walked into the football building, I had no clue.”

The combination of new and improved training facilities and the Orange Bowl victory certainly helped reshape the perception of Kansas football — a fact that makes recruiting, and Mitchell’s job, slightly easier.

In the last two weeks alone, Mitchell persuaded two players — cornerback Dexter McDonald and running back Brandon Bourbon — to switch their commitments from other schools.

Perhaps as much as any of Kansas’ current signees, Bourbon’s switch from Stanford to Kansas generated plenty of outside interest. But the decision also serves as an indication of Mitchell’s recruiting capabilities.

After realizing that Bourbon, who is from Potosi, Mo., wanted his family to be able to see him play, Mitchell pitched the running back on a simple idea: If he went to Kansas, his family could see every game.

It’s those types of situations that have enabled Mitchell to become a successful and well-respected recruiter.

“He knows how to communicate with people,” Gill said. “He has a strong desire to speak and I think he has an opportunity to build a relationship in a deeper way.”

Although selling recruits on Kansas may be easier than during his previous tenure, Mitchell insisted that the job isn’t any less demanding.

For instance, both Gill and Mitchell cited the need to recruit more offensive linemen in upcoming years. The Jayhawks have only one offensive lineman in their current recruiting class.

Still, Gill and Mitchell expressed their satisfaction with the incoming crop of players. And after all, Mitchell — or any Kansas coach — isn’t attempting to sell a downtrodden football program anymore.

“You’re looking at a team that’s coming off a 5-7 record last season,” Mitchell said. “When we first came here, I think it was 0-11. It’s not broken by any stretch of the imagination.”

— Edited by Ashley Montgomery

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