With the most recent National Letter of Intent Day now come and gone, fans of the University of Colorado football program have breathed a collective sigh of relief.
The Buffs ended last season knowing that attrition had ravaged the vaunted 2012 class (rated in the mid 30's nationally by the recruiting services) to the point that only 10 of the original 29 remained to graduate. The endless task of recruiting is what allows college football programs to bring in the annual wave of graduating high school seniors to replenish their programs.
With only 85 scholarships available for the entire team, most schools shoot to have an incoming class of 25-28 young men each year, with expected attrition bringing down the total so that the total always remains at the NCAA mandated 85.
Attrition happens for numerous reasons. Kids get homesick or have family issues and transfer to be closer to home. Some leave for greener pastures and greater opportunity to play, while some are forced to quit due to injury. Others fail to make the transition to college level student commitments and leave due to grades, and others are asked to leave because the have failed to live by the standards of conduct their schools expect of them. And some are taken from the school after society has determined that criminal activity has necessitated a move to local jails or state or federal prison.
One of the primary reasons that the Colorado Buffaloes had fallen so far from their gloried past was bad recruiting over the last decade. And that bad recruiting is not based on the amateur evaluations of the so-called recruiting services. No, the bad recruiting was based upon coaches prior to Mike MacIntyre not effectively determining which young men had the academic and social skills to make it in college life, or in some cases, which young men would end up as convicted felons instead of being student athletes.
The collective sigh of relief felt by the Buffs faithful was due to the team bringing in 18 quality young men in this year's class. Mike MacIntyre and his coaches were able to recover from the horrible hole left from a class with 67% attrition due to Mac having a number of young men who are scheduled to graduate ahead of schedule. Due to the severe time commitments of being a college football player, most young men take 5 years to graduate, and that fact is built into the system though the use of a redshirt year.
This is MacIntyre's fourth class at Colorado, although he was not responsible for most of the first class. Unlike many coaches who take over at a Power Five conference school, MacIntyre did not rescind any of the scholarship offers that the prior coach had made. He felt that the University of Colorado needed to honor those commitments, and that integrity from his first months as head coach has carried over to this day.
Recruits and their parents KNOW that Mac and the University of Colorado are committed to these young men not only getting an education, but also graduating before they leave. Many schools try to sign up to 30 young men a year knowing that 30% of them will be pushed aside before graduation ever has a chance to come along. Those schools are known as football factories, where football takes precedence over academics.
That is not the University of Colorado, and that is not the Pac-12. MacIntyre has rebuilt the program the right way. His young men are here for the long haul, and when they leave they will have a real degree to take with them.
And fans of the University of Colorado football program can breathe better knowing that winning days ahead will have been achieved honorably and without lowering the standards of the university and the Boulder community. The players for the CU football program are the very proper definition of student-athletes.
