Oregon State’s appearance in the biggest bowl game since the 2001 Fiesta Bowl might have had an impact on recruiting rankings of the 2013 class. The Alamo Bowl pairing of OSU and Texas was announced on December 2nd, 2012 and the national recruiting rankings of OSU’s 2013 class rose immediately thereafter. This rise in the recruiting rankings was not attributable to the commitment of a specific prospective student athlete or group of student athletes at that time or thereafter.
2013 national recruiting class rankings and commitments for Oregon State University. Click to enlarge (Data source – Rivals.com)
The 2013 recruiting class got a late start and OSU was not even ranked by Rivals prior to July 1st 2012. From that point forward until early December, OSU’s class grew in size with each commitment added but the national recruiting ranking did not rise and in fact languished among the nation’s worst recruiting classes for BCS schools. OSU’s class was ranked no higher than 80th during that period and was often much below that mark. That the ranking of the 2013 class was low was not totally surprising given that conventional wisdom suggested a 3-9 record coming close on the heels of a 5-7 record would have a negative impact on subsequent recruiting success.
But after the announcement of the Alamo Bowl on December 2nd, the national rankings for OSU’s 2013 class rose with the addition of each commitment. The first half of the commitment total in OSU’s class had little impact on national recruiting ranking but after the bowl pairing each commitment increased OSU’s spot in the rankings. Re-evaluation of OSU’s commitments by Rivals did result in some improvement of the class ranking but did not apparently affect the rankings as much as the event of the Alamo Bowl announcement.
As a result of this turn in fortune, OSU’s national recruiting class ranking has risen from what would could have been the worst in school history (#55 was the previous low) to at the time of this writing is the 3rd best all-time (#40) for OSU with a few weeks remaining in the recruiting cycle for 2013.
