COLLEGE STATION – ESPN The Magazine featured college recruiting in its latest issue to coincide with national signing day, held on Feb. 2, and included a ranking of top college recruiters in the nation across all college sports.
Pat Henry, Texas A&M track and field head coach, topped the list of coaches ranked by the publication. ESPNU and ESPN The Magazine asked an all-star panel who are the top 20 recruiters in college sports.
The top 20 list included such notable coaches as North Carolina women’s soccer coach Anson Dorrance (No. 2), USC football assistant coach Ed Orgeron (No. 3), Mike Krzyzewski of Duke basketball (No. 6), volleyball coach Russ Rose of Penn State (No. 7), Alabama football assistant Burton Burns (No. 8), South Carolina baseball assistant Chad Holbrook (No. 10), John Calipari of Kentucky basketball (No. 12) and Ohio State basketball coach Thad Matta (No. 15).
“The way our program operates I’ve always tried to do my best to surround myself with other great coaches that work hard and all in the same direction,” Henry said.
“A lot of the times it’s the head coach who gets all the accolades, but it’s about all of us all the time. This is for my staff also. This isn’t just about me. It’s about everyone that is involved with this program.
“All of my assistants have always been those who recruit for our program and the university. It’s about everybody having an eye for talent, an understanding of what the ultimate goal is and how we are trying to accomplish that goal.”
The Aggie track and field coaching staff includes assistants Vince Anderson, Juan De La Garza, Alleyne Francique, Jim VanHootegem and Dan Waters.
The rankings included a note regarding Henry and his role of filling roster spots that cover six aspects of a track and field season with men’s and women’s cross country along with indoor and outdoor track and field.
With a limit of 30.6 scholarships, which breaks down to 18 for women and 12.6 for men, the program relies on a large portion of the scholarships to be awarded as partial.
“That’s the tough part of our job,” Henry noted. “We talk to so many good kids, but we’re limited by dollars. Over 75 percent of the time we are offering a partial scholarship to a kid we are recruiting. We would love to offer more to every recruit we have.
“It’s fun to listen to the head-count coaches talk when I sit down with them. They can’t imagine trying to recruit anybody that is good and only being able to offer them a book scholarship.”
With the total of 30.6 scholarships Texas A&M has been able to field a team that usually reaches a total of 120 athletes. A majority of those athletes are from the state of Texas, but recruiting across the nation and internationally is a key aspect to sustaining a winning program.
“Our team numbers around 120 and 100 of those athletes are from Texas,” Henry said. “We have a bigger population in this state to work with, so we’ve been able to do some different things here than I was able to at LSU.
“It’s still the same process, though. Winning in this sport dictates that you have to recruit in your state and area, but you also have to recruit talent from all over this country and maybe all over the world to be really successful and win in this sport.”
Henry and his staff, now in their seventh season at Texas A&M, have captured men’s and women’s NCAA Outdoor team championships the past two years. The only other program to accomplish the same feat occurred 20 years ago at LSU, where Henry was the head coach.
The recent signing class the Aggies announced last week have a total of 29 athletes joining the program next fall.
FIVE-STAR RECRUITERS
As selected by ESPNU and ESPN The Magazine with input from a panel of experts
1. Pat Henry, Texas A&M – men’s & women’s track and field / cross country
2. Anson Dorrance, North Carolina – women’s soccer
3. Ed Orgeron, USC – football assistant
4. Chris Dailey, Connecticut – women’s basketball assistant
5. Missy Meharg, Maryland – women’s field hockey
6. Mike Krzyzewski, Duke – basketball
7. Russ Rose, Penn State – women’s volleyball
8. Burton Burns, Alabama – football assistant
9. Jay Clark, Georgia – women’s gymnastics
10. Chad Holbrook, South Carolina – baseball assistant
11. Dan Jordan, Alaska – rifle
12. Jon Calipari, Kentucky – basketball
13. Mike McGraw, Oklahoma State – men’s golf
14. Jovan Vavic, USC – men’s and women’s water polo
15. Thad Matta, Ohio State – basketball
16. Kelly Inouye-Perez, UCLA – softball
17. Mike LoPresti, Fairleigh Dickinson – women’s bowling
18. Tosh Lupoi, California – football assistant
19. Kelly Amonte Hiller, Northwestern – women’s lacrosse
20. J Robinson, Minnesota – wrestling