IOWA CITY, Iowa – Over the past two decades, the college football recruiting landscape has changed dramatically in response to the rise of the Internet.

But the results each year have pretty much stayed the same.

The blue bloods land most of the blue-chip recruits now as they did 20 years ago and long before that. There are few places where the rich get richer with more regularity than college football recruiting.

That is apparent with the current Big Ten recruiting rankings where either Ohio State or Michigan sit atop most lists heading into national signing day on Wednesday.

Iowa’s 2016 recruiting class was formed in unusual fashion as a record 16 players committed in the month of June alone.

As a class, though, it’s similar to most previous recruiting classes under veteran coach Kirk Ferentz. Iowa traditionally finishes in the middle of the Big Ten pack in recruiting. And that’s exactly where the 24-player class is ranked by both Rivals.com and Scout.com as the seventh best class in the 14-team conference.

At least half of the players in the class are being recruited for defense, including five defensive ends. Two of the players in the class – Toks Akrinibade and Emmanuel Rugamba – are classified as athletes by Rivals, which means they could play multiple positions.
Akrinibade made his biggest impact in high school as a running back, while Rugamba played receiver and defensive back in high school.

The class also has one quarterback in Wisconsin native Nathan Stanley. He will be among five quarterbacks on scholarship for Iowa next season. Stanley stayed committed to Iowa for over 14 months despite having an offer from the Wisconsin Badgers.

As for the changes in recruiting, it used to be that your only option besides doing a face-to-face interview was to call a recruit at his high school or on a landline and hope that he was home. The Internet and cell phones have certainly made recruits more accessible if they choose to be.

Recruits now often announce their commitments on social media, with Twitter and Facebook two popular ways of reaching an audience.

Eyebrows no longer get raised when a high school freshman or sophomore receives a scholarship offer because if something unusual happens enough times it starts to seem normal.

The recruiting process has gotten itself in a big hurry to where kids barely out of junior high are being closely evaluated by college coaches and by the so-called recruiting experts.

But this rush to get noticed still hasn’t changed what ultimately occurs in recruiting and it probably never will change it. In some ways, college football recruiting is as predictable as a Chuck Norris fist fight because the same teams always seem to win on signing day and beyond.

Nick Saban is now being mentioned as possibly the greatest college head coach of all time in the wake of winning his fifth national title, including his fourth at Alabama.

As an NFL coach, though, Saban left much to be desired.

He bolted from the Miami Dolphins in 2006 after just two uneventful seasons to accept the Alabama job and all the conveniences that come with it. Saban might be a great coach, but it doesn’t matter nearly as much in college as the NFL because his Alabama teams almost always have an edge in talent as part of the rich getting richer.

Ferentz doesn’t have that luxury at Iowa where player development is crucial to long-term success.

Iowa’s success this past season shows that recruiting still is an inexact science despite all the people who make a living evaluating and ranking prospects.

Every college football coach in the United States will rave about his 2016 recruiting class on Wednesday as part of the national signing day festivities. There is no such thing as a bad recruiting class on signing day.

Time is the ultimate judge for a recruiting class.

And more times than not, the rich get richer.

Rivals.com recruiting rankings as of Tuesday Feb. 2

1. Ohio State
2. Louisiana State
3. Florida State
4. Mississippi
5. Michigan
6. Notre Dame
7. Clemson
8. Florida
9. Alabama
10. Baylor
11. Michigan State
15. Penn State
21. Nebraska
31. Wisconsin
41. Iowa
45. Northwestern
46. Minnesota
48. Maryland
64. Illinois
67. Indiana
77. Purdue
78. Rutgers

Scout.com

1. Louisiana State
2. Ohio State
3. Mississippi
4. Florida
5. Michigan
6. Alabama
7. Florida State
8. Notre Dame
9. Michigan State
10. UCLA
15. Penn State
20. Wisconsin
24. Nebraska
34. Iowa
39. Northwestern
44. Minnesota
53. Maryland
58. Illinois
59. Indiana
68. Rutgers
89. Purdue