How UK football’s wild ride through the 2023 recruiting wars ended in a good place

Back in the summer, when Louisville’s and Tennessee’s 2023 football recruiting efforts were drawing boffo reviews and Kentucky’s were not, alarm bells rang in the Big Blue Nation.

Mark Stoops heard the clanging.

“Some people may have been a little concerned. I really wasn’t,” the UK head man said Wednesday at a news conference at Kroger Field. “We were working hard to try to finish as strong as we could. We don’t always look at that, but if you look at average star ranking (per recruit), we were really pretty high, pretty strong.”

Boosted by what is perceived to be stellar work in the transfer portal, the once-widely-doubted Kentucky 2023 recruiting effort has ended up with mostly positive reviews.

With 17 high school commits, Kentucky stood No. 33 in the 247 Sports Composite rankings as of Thursday morning. Using the average-star-ranking-per-recruit metric, only 20 schools had higher ratings than Kentucky in the Rivals.com team rankings.

With UK still hoping to add Georgia four-star running back Jamarion Wilcox, let’s examine five factors that defined Kentucky’s 2023 recruiting efforts.

1. Michigan became the “new Cincinnati.” Early on, the main reason that Kentucky’s 2023 recruiting was perceived to be lagging was because Luke Fickell and UC spent last summer cleaning up in the Midwest. By the middle of June, Cincinnati held verbal commitments from nine players — six from Ohio, two from Michigan and one from Indiana — that UK had pursued.

Yet by the time the college football early-signing period began Wednesday, Fickell was the coach at Wisconsin and Kentucky had beaten UC for prized Ohio slot receiver Anthony Brown and won over former Bearcats tight end commit Khamari Anderson from Detroit.

Late in the cycle, it was Michigan, not Cincinnati, that turned out to be the primary recruiting nemesis for UK. Boosted by two straight appearances in the College Football Playoff, Jim Harbaugh’s Wolverines won out over UK for cornerback Cameron Calhoun (Cincinnati), wideout Karmello English (Phenix City, Ala.), outside linebacker Jason Hewlett (Youngstown, Ohio), cornerback Jyaire Hill (Kankakee, Ill.) and defensive back D’Juan Waller (Youngstown, Ohio).

2. UK’s in-state evaluations differed from the recruiting gurus. Kentucky signed four in-state prospects — Boyle County edge Tommy Ziesmer, Madison Central offensive tackle Malachi Wood, Frederick Douglass safety Ty Bryant and PRP H-back Jakob Dixon.

Of those four, only Ziesmer (No. 5) and Wood (No. 10) were ranked in the top 10 class of 2023 prospects in the commonwealth, according to the 247 Composite Rankings.

Of the other prospects in the top five in Kentucky in the 247 Composite, UK lost a hot recruiting battle to Tennessee for South Warren cornerback Cristian Conyer (No. 3). The Cats never seemed to gain traction with Beechwood cornerback Antonio Robinson (No. 1), who signed with Wake Forest after moving to Kentucky from Florida before his senior season.

UK extended early offers to St. Xavier defensive lineman Micah Carter (No. 2) and Henderson County D-lineman Saadiq Clements (No. 4) then did not ardently pursue either. Both players committed to Purdue, then flipped to Louisville after Jeff Brohm moved south.

3. The “Brohm factor.” For most of the Stoops coaching era at UK (since 2013), Louisville has been a minimal factor in in-state recruiting.

From the 2014 signing class through 2022, under the U of L coaching administrations of Bobby Petrino and Scott Satterfield, the Cardinals signed only 10 in-state prospects total in nine years. Only one of those players, Belfry offensive lineman Cole Bentley in 2017, came from outside Jefferson County.

A former Trinity High School and U of L quarterback, ex-Cardinals assistant and Western Kentucky head coach, Brohm has ties throughout the state. With him back in the commonwealth, Louisville figures to be a much larger factor in competing for the best home-grown talent.

In addition to adding Carter and Clements, Brohm also went to the transfer portal to acquire ex-Frederick Douglass standout Devin Neal (Baylor) and former Trinity star Stephen Herron (Stanford).

“Great connections to the state, strong impact in Louisville,” Stoops said of Brohm’s projected recruiting profile. “They’ll do very well. We’ll continue to battle with them and everyone else.”

4. Keeping “pipelines” flowing. Over the past three years, Kentucky has lost capable assistants who were responsible for recruiting Detroit (Steve Clinkscale), Nashville (Clinkscale and Eric Wolford) and the Deep South (Jon Sumrall) to other jobs.

Yet UK was nevertheless able to sign coveted 2023 prospects from Detroit (tight end Anderson), Nashville (wide receiver Shamar Porter) and Dixie (center Koby Keenum and defensive back Avery Stuart from Alabama, defensive lineman Tavion Gadson and linebacker Grant Godfrey from Georgia).

In a year of coaching staff transition, it was crucial that Kentucky was still able to keep its primary “recruiting pipelines” open.

5. Portal masters. The college football transfer portal is the equivalent of NFL free agency. It’s where you go to fill immediate needs.

When this year’s portal window opened, Kentucky needed a starting quarterback, a starting-caliber running back, offensive line help, including a left tackle capable of blocking SEC edge rushers, and immediate cornerback help.

On paper, Stoops, recruiting ace Vince Marrow and UK have already used the portal to fill the Wildcats roster’s biggest holes.

Ex-North Carolina State star Devin Leary was considered by many the top quarterback in the portal. Former Vanderbilt star Ray Davis was a 1,000-yard rusher (1,042) in the SEC in 2022.

A multi-year starter at Northern Illinois, Marques Cox is being brought in to assume the left tackle spot. Former Alabama offensive lineman Tanner Bowles may start at guard for UK in 2023.

Meanwhile, transfers JQ Hardaway (Cincinnati) and Jantzen Dunn (Ohio State) could be Kentucky’s starting cornerbacks for multiple seasons.

Working the portal so well helped Stoops and Co. end a challenging recruiting cycle in a mostly good place.

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