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Illinois Football: Illini leading the way when it comes to St. Louis recruiting

By Rees Woodcock

The Gateway Arch, center, stands ahead of the second U.S. presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S., on Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. As has become tradition, the second debate will resemble a town hall meeting, with the candidates free to sit or roam the stage instead of standing behind podiums, while members of the audience -- uncommitted voters, screened by the Gallup Organization -- will ask half the questions. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images
The Gateway Arch, center, stands ahead of the second U.S. presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S., on Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. As has become tradition, the second debate will resemble a town hall meeting, with the candidates free to sit or roam the stage instead of standing behind podiums, while members of the audience -- uncommitted voters, screened by the Gallup Organization -- will ask half the questions. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images /
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The St. Louis area has been a hotbed for Illinois football recruiting since Lovie Smith took over the program.

The history of snagging players from St. Louis wasn’t extensive before Lovie became head coach. I believe the last player to commit to Illinois before he was named the leader of this program was Griffin Palmer from the class of 2016. He was from DeSmet High School. Before that, you have to go all the way back to the class of 2006 to find the last recruit from St. Louis. That player was Jerry Brown who was from Vashon High School. He was rated as a three-star recruit and was the No. 876 player in the class of 2006.

Now that Lovie is the head coach, Illinois has actually become the leader of St. Louis recruiting. They continue to snag solid talent from this area each recruiting class. The class of 2017 brought Larry Boyd and Tony Adams, both top 1000 players. The class of 2019 brought Isaiah Williams, Shammond Cooper and Moses Okpala all of which are top 600 players.

If you tally up the top recruits from the St. Louis area over the last four recruiting classes, including the class of 2020, Illinois actually has the most St. Louis commits. They come in with a total of five St. Louis recruits who have committed to play football in Champaign. No. 2 on this list is Missouri. They have a total of four St. Louis commits. No. 3 would be Ohio State who has three St. Louis commits.

The Illinois coaching staff has done some great work in the state of Missouri, specifically the St. Louis area. Are there some flaws with this coaching staff when it comes to in-state recruiting? Sure, but having one of your recruiting pipelines be St. Louis is never a bad thing.

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Illinois is building into a Big Ten contending team. They are snagging talent from an area of the country where there is plenty to go around. Something tells me the class of 2020 is going to be good to the Orange and Blue too. The future is so bright, as long as we continue to win St. Louis.

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