Rutgers State Champs

A couple of years, the idea of Rutgers being crowned State champions of recruiting for New Jersey was a joke, but now it appears to be a reality. Recruiting service, 247Sports, crowned Rutgers the state champion of recruiting. 


According to the story, Rutgers got 10 of the top 32 prospects in the state. This was the sites verdict on Rutgers recruiting performance in the state: "Keeping Devin Fuller at home would have made the Scarlet Knights feel a lot better at their relative domicile domination. Still, they deserve credit for fending off the vultures amid their 11th-hour coaching change,'' the report stated. 


It's amazing how things have changed over the years. In 2005, Rutgers was able to get one of the top 30 players in the state to come to the State University of New Jersey. In 2008, Rutgers made progress securing commitments from seven of the top 30 prospects in the state. 


This year, Rutgers did a great job keeping the top prospects in state. Their success in state helped Rutgers get the top ranked class in the Big East.

Fox will continue to grow the game

In September, I wrote how Fox Sports choice to show Barclay's Premier League games on tape delay was a brilliant idea. Two weekends ago, Fox took it the next level by showing Manchester United vs. Arsenal live as a lead into the NFL Conference Championship Games. Sure the rating where not great. According to ESPN, the match was seen by 1.3 million views. 

This week Fox is at it again as they show Manchester United vs. Chelsea on Super Bowl Sunday at 11 a.m. I personally expect the numbers to increase and this to be more of a rating success. I would not be surprised if there was a couple of more Premier League games show on Fox before the end of the year.

Fox has to stay committed to showing top flight soccer over the next couple of years. In October, Fox won the English-language U.S. television rights for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, outbidding incumbent ESPN and NBC for soccer's showpiece tournament. Fox agreed to pay around $425 million for the two-tournament package, a person familiar with the bidding told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because the figure was not made public. It also secured English-language radio rights. If they are going to make these tournaments work they are going to have to continue to show soccer to gain the respect of fans.

Fox should have learned a lesson from doing the BCS Bowl games a couple of years ago. During that time, Fox just did the bowl games and did not do any regular season games. During the  BCS games Fox had people who had no real college experience doing the games and it made for a terrible TV product. They have to stay connected to soccer before these events to ensure fans that they are committed to doing things right.

Our Biggest loss, Our biggest gain

A week ago the Rutgers Football program had their biggest loss, when head coach Greg Schiano left for the Tampa Bay Bucs. Now they have their biggest gain as Don Bosco's 5-star defensive tackle Darius Hamilton commits to Rutgers earlier tonight.

The commitment has a chance to keep the class together and make this the best class in the history of the program.

Nothing beats dancing with a Mascot

Nothing beats knocking a Premier League side out of the FA Cup when you are a lower league side. Brighton did that by knocking out Newcastle 1-0 over the weekend. The fun of the Cup was shown by Brighton's Adam El-Abd as he dances with an FA Cup mascot after the win. This is my favorite moment of the weekend.