UConn Football Recruiting Recap: July 2015

Bob Diaco and his staff got to a late, and mildly worrisome, start to the 2016 recruiting class in terms of securing commitments. By the time most schools already had a couple of commitments, UConn got their first one in Virginia quarterback Donovan Williams with a second coming shortly thereafter.

So far, UConn has beaten N.C. State, Illinois, Northwestern, Northern Illinois, Temple, Wyoming, Toledo, Virginia, Vanderbilt, Buffalo, Wake Forest, Army, and Hawaii, among others, for recruits. The class is expected to be small, with only 13 seniors leaving the program, so UConn is actually in pretty good shape with six very strong verbal commitments on the board.

A few key notes:

• No matter how you slice it, this recruiting class is shaping up to be higher rated than the 2015 class, on average.
• Because the class will be small in number, and school recruiting ranking scores reward larger incoming classes, the national and conference ranking where UConn ends up will undervalue the quality.
• Keyion Dixon is the only player rated 2 stars by both scouting sites, but was a legitimate standout at this past weekend's New York vs. New England All-Star Challenge and is difficult to project as a wide receiver prospect since he plays quarterback for Glastonbury High.
• With two players from Connecticut, the Class of 2016 already has more in-state prospects than last year, where OL Brian Cespedes from New London was the only scholarship freshman from CT.
• Diaco and his staff are going across the map to find the right guys for this team, with the four out-of-state commitments coming from Virginia, Chicago, North Carolina and New Jersey.