Kids like to get away from home. UH facilities were not as good as some of the high schools back then. The lure of big name schools and bragging rights. There are myriad reasons.
Yes, uta pushed the ncaa to impose probations on us. These made historically negative impact to our program. Despite this we still finished 11-1 in 1979 and were 5th Nationally ranked.
I detailed in another thread. These probations were catastrophic to our program. and public/fans growth. uta knew what they were doing.
The data that I posted is interesting because it clearly shows where our “strength and weaknesses” are when it comes to recruiting. From 247sports HCWF and his staff are able to quantify actual results vs specific high schools. You can expand it to counties then state. DH was such a major recruiter failure that it set us back years. Will HCWF recruit out of state players? He already has with Louisiana. Without a doubt he has “eyes” in other states. Flipping a tcu commit shows us that HCWF is focused in Texas where we can do way better. uta’s and atm’s lists are very interesting. Is it a trend or are they taking more of a National recruiting approach? Well even though Elko was at atm he is not from Texas or far from it. Sarkisian is not from Texas either. Prior to bama he was recruiting all over the West coast. We improve our Texas recruiting? This will be another major step. I mentioned it yesterday. We have a ton of players located all over the country. I would hope that their way of getting back is to try to convince let say an Oceanside (California) player to play for UH instead of USC. Again, this is an example. Do we have a program in place for this. i have no clues if we do or not.
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Factoid about uta : UH FB Boosters named the “Taxi Squad” use to meet at the River Oaks Country Club . I was there. Then CBY/ Team starting beating Texas and we were not invited back again . I heard him say this in public. Texas truly hated UH.
Go Coogs !
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There’s no reason with the right coach like Fritz , we can’t have good recruiting.
The UH now is way better , especially after the 100 yr plan is done that we can’t recruit well.
Again , we only need local kids, Texas kids and La kids
Lsu wins by mainly recruiting La kids and some Texas. National isn’t a must.
The current UH after 2027 and even now isn’t the old UH.
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Jimmy Johnson once said if you want to win a national championship, get the best kids from Texas and Florida.
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Also local recruiting is first step bc if you can’t get local kids to like your school, it’s a problem
Helton said he wanted a fence around Houston but he failed so we had to go juco and national.
Most good teams recruit great locally then branch out for other needs.
Fritz seems to be doing great locally
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These feels true, but I don’t actually agree. The top tier schools pull the best from every state. The good tier wins in their state. Bad tier can’t win anything.
Depends which state your in. Byu has to go national but teams in Texas, Fla and Louisiana for example get most from state then branch out. You do what you have to do .
Lsu mainly gets Louisiana kids and Texas and has been great for yrs.
UT has cared about us in 40 years. 40.
Bill Yeoman hasn’t recruited in 40 years and and recruiting has changed a bit in that time.
There are no more ‘diamonds in the rough’ or hidden recruits. The players we get are earned these days.
The portal has also changed this. 40 years ago you couldn’t leave UH or UT and just go somewhere else. You were stuck.
I am enjoying what he has done in the portal and am hopeful on the high school recruits but probably won’t learn their names or worry about them until they are starting.
I saw we are doing quite well compared to the previous coaching staff.
Great!
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When I joined the Taxi Squad, we were meeting at Sonny Looks Sirloin House. Good times.
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It all depends on the state population and high school programs available. Texas has more people and high schools than Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and Kentucky combined. (I just looked up their populations as well as Texas’s.)
I assume we will always recruit a few out of sate kids, but I don’t know if that will be from high school or the portal.
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Any updates on Davian Gorce and Lakeyleon Graves? Would love to get another 4 star and boost our ranking. 
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I don’t care about our recruiting ranking as much a I do about getting the right kids for our culture and systems. Going by recruiting rankings, shouldn’t aTm finish in the top ten every year and play in at least a top tier bowl if not the CFP?
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Hank Stram’s Kansas City Chiefs won a Super Bowl with a couple of 5’9" RBs running behind a line that averaged 6’5". Nobody could find the RB’s behind that line.
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I am not really interested in atm rankings.
I only care about Houston and I would like to get kids that are great culture fit that are also super talented. I expect our coaches will do a much better job realizing their potential than that other school you named.
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Every time I hear people from North Carolina talk about visiting Houston… they say it’s awesome.
I think the city itself is an advantage for recruiting nationally.
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I think you are right:
Earl Campbell was 5’-11"
Barry Sanders was 5’-8"
Robert Newhouse was 5’-10"
Thurman Thomas was 5’-10"
They all seemed to do OK.
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Maurice Jones Drew… 5’7"