micah mazzccua

Previously: B1G East, B1G West Part 2

Today is part three, the final piece, of our offseason series looking at the B1G football teams and how they handled the transfer portal and NFL Draft declarations. The final teams we have to check off are Nebraska and Minnesota, plus the four new teams. Since I am not as intimately familiar with the new teams, I won't go into as much detail as I have with the other teams, but will introduce these squads with a quick overview of their spring rosters and feel of the programs. 

Nebraska 

EXITS 

Nebraska's often-cluttered QB room got some clarity this offseason, as the Huskers saw both Jeff Sims and Chubba Purdy hit the transfer portal. Sims has yet to find a landing spot, but Purdy has signed on to Nevada. Elsewhere on the offense the Huskers saw eligibility expire for RB Anthony Grant and guards Nouredin Nouili and Ethan Piper, as well as WRs Billy Kemp IV and Marcus Washington. But that's mostly it, as Big Red will be able to roll over most of the rest of their production, including three RBs (two of which, Rahmir Johnson and Gabe Ervin, missed most of the season with injury), QB Heinrich Haarberg, both TEs, three tackles, and several pieces on the OL. 

Defensively they lost some pieces in the LB room and the secondary, but again come out in relatively solid position, which should allow for Matt Rhule to have a stronger second season. Starting safety Omar Brown and corner Quinton Newsome, both solid college players, have exhausted their eligibility and are moving on to further endeavors, but two separate corners (Tommi Hill/Malcolm Hartzog) and safeties (Singleton/Gifford) who gained experience this season return. Starting LB Luke Reimer moves on and LB Nick Henrich has chosen to retire after a litany of injuries, but the DL returns intact outside of reserve tackle Blaise Gunnerson, who is also retiring. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: lots of names]

Starting last year I began tracking how the recruiting rankings of Michigan commits and top targets moved, since that sometimes can be as informative as the rankings themselves.

Previously: July 2019 offense. Feb 2019 offense/defense, July 2018

Let's go over the rules again:

1. Rankings Have Gravity. Over the course of a cycle everybody moves down at a normal pace as various other players are moved up. If you're top 20 at the beginning of your junior year, if you get to the end of your senior year in the top 150 you've really stood pat. The further down you started the less I care about downward movement, because nothing really changed about the sites' opinions on that guy—just their opinions on other guys.

2. Every Site Has Their Own Ratings. I'll give you my composite numbers  on a 5-star scale and the raw numbers in the charts. For the others:

3. Moves Are Always Contextual. You have to consider what site moved a guy, what box they have him in, and when they saw him or rated him last. ESPN for example will tend to look at a guy when they need to, fire off a rating, and then never go back. Rivals will often hold a guy in the high 3-star range that everyone else loves until the guy gets to a Rivals camp. 24/7 does the same.

On with the show! I've included senior highlights of each if they're available.

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RB Blake Corum

Committed: 6/27/2019. Current ☆ average: 4.39 (up from 4.16)

What it means: Corum got a big boost over the course of his senior year from every site, and where he has ended up depended on where he started. ESPN's was only less dramatic because they evaluated him late last summer when he was already on the rise. 24/7 was taking a wait-'n-see approach, dropping him about 50 spots in their late February re-rank then leaving him there through an Under Armour camp that belonged to Rivals. Since then Corum was named the Player of the Year in Maryland as St. Francis rolled over a schedule of some of the best high school teams in the country, led by Corum. USA Today even wondered at the rankings as they rose:

Blake Corum might be underrated

It’s not just his huge linemen or play calling. Running back Blake Corum has now put up 200 total yards against two of the best defenses in the country in IMG and Mater Dei.

Corum is widely regarded as one of the best running backs in the country. He is a Michigan commit, is ranked by the 247Sports Composite as the No. 13 at his position and No. 143 in the country.

But might those rankings be too low? It’s tough to imagine 12 backs leading an offense better than this player. Could there really be 142 players better?

Rivals' Adam Friedman did a film on Corum in their "Rapid Riser" segment.

#RivalsRankingsWeek: Rapid Riser

RB Blake Corum jumped 136 spots from the #Rivals250 to the #Rivals100! The #Michigan commit now sits at No. 67.

️ @RivalsFriedman breaks down @blake_corum's rapid rise.

1⃣0⃣0⃣ https://t.co/1VGbLcV0eb
2⃣5⃣0⃣ https://t.co/hsWGNtxlRn pic.twitter.com/hlOglRCXEd

— Rivals (@Rivals) December 5, 2019

I think there's little doubt the sites are following the national headlines on this one. He's having one of the best senior seasons in the country against the best competition.

Outlook: They're the relative skeptic so here's how 247's evaluation leads off:

Concern about being physically maxed out….Needs to show he can run between tackles consistently in college. Size to touch ball 15-plus times a game a concern. Multi-year high-level contributor at Top 15 program. Could develop into a Day Three NFL draft pick.

Dohn has continued beating this "I don't know if he can be Northwestern's offense all by himself" drum even after answering the part about running inside:

He ran for tough yards in the middle, and he was able to get to the edge a few times. He was patient and let the plays develop, and he picked up key yardage to get first downs. Whether he can touch the ball 20-plus times a game in college remains a question, but he can carry the load for St. Frances.

I find this dubious. There is certainly a kind of recruit to watch out for who has an early growth spurt, puts up crazy numbers as a high school underclassman, then falls back to the pack as the rest of his class hits puberty too (examples: Ricardo Miller, Marvin Robinson, a zillion offensive linemen who were already 300 as sophomores). There's also the kind of high school dynamo who'll never be big enough to play college football, but that's more of a concern for 5'8"/165 guys; Corum is 30 pounds heavier than that. That take however doesn't seem likely to change unless Corum's body type changes.

There's always the worry with a running back who was used to a great offensive line—both tackles are going to Power 5 schools, Mazzccua is in this post, and the other guard is going to Kent State—that he's just getting escorted to the second level (see Ty Isaac, Derrick Green) but if you watch the highlights that doesn't seem to be the case.

[The rest AFTER THE JUMP]

Uh, I guess we forgot to do a hello for the second commit, and lowest-ranked, of Michigan's four St. Frances Academy prospects. He was also the seventh player to join the class at the time, and the first OL of what's now up to four. Our reasoning for waiting at the time was sound: nobody had anything on him. Until last year Mazzccua was playing for a small school in Philadelphia and Temple was his only offer. A transfer to Biff Poggi's mega-program, and the release of his junior film in early 2019, led to a Syracuse offer on January 24th. Michigan followed the next day—the day teammate Osman Savage committed—and Mazzccua made it official a month later, following an unofficial visit in February.

A bunch of scouting was dumped in the aftermath, all of which described a huge, agile, sushi raw mountain somewhere in the realm of 6'6"/290 (Rivals when he committed) or 6'5"/335 (24/7). There's a little more out there now, so let's play the feud for him, finally.

GURU RATINGS

None of these existed when he committed 20 weeks ago, so everybody's playing catch-up, and that means rankings in the "Michigan probably knows what they're doing?" range. Rivals ignored him until February 22.

[Hit THE JUMP for scouting from those two sites, video, and the rest.]