Iowa Director of Recruiting Tyler Barnes visited with the media on Signing Day to give us his rundown on how the class came together and some of the key players who are now Hawkeyes.
TYLER BARNES OPENING STATEMENT
I'll hit a couple items and open it up for questions for everybody. First and foremost, thanks to everybody for being out here. I wish it was in person. I enjoy being in person more than being on zoom.
We know it's exciting the way we finished today. I think our staff did a good job. Obviously, we probably didn't get off to the start we were really hoping for in June, and really through the summer I think there were a few things that kind of played into that, as Coach had mentioned just a little bit.
When you go back to last year's class, we had a majority of class on campus before the COVID dead period hit. So we were able to get some momentum there and get the bulk of our class done. When we fast forward to this class, I think we only had three guys that we signed today that had made it to campus before that COVID dead period hit -- Aaron Graves, Xavier Nwankpa, Jayden Montgomery. The 14 guys never got to campus until the very earliest June of this year.
When we got guys on campus, we obviously knew we were going to have a small class. We wanted to be a little bit pickier than we probably have been in years past. But the biggest thing is I think our staff did a really good job. We stayed on some of those guys that didn't commit to us in June, a couple guys that went elsewhere and ended up signing with us today.
As Coach Ferentz mentioned -- he's been in this a long time, he's incredibly wise -- it's not a sprint, it's a marathon. You've got to be patient. I think our staff did a good job just being patient. Seeing some guys in their senior film in high school, sticking with some of those guys that were here in June that did not commit to us at the time. Ultimately, I can't say enough about what our staff did just to finish.
I think we're very pleased with how things turned out today, the guys we were able to add into this class. Like Coach said, we're not done yet. We've got a few spots. We'll get into January and February. We'll see what's out there, both high school wise and portal wise. And we'll keep adding to this class.
I can't give you the definitive number. It's pretty fluid. We still have some guys here on the roster making some decisions. We'll have a better picture, I think, once we get through the bowl game and have an idea what the remaining needs are for this ‘22 class. That being said, I'll open up for questions for you guys.
Q. When you land a recruit like Xavier, what does that do for the rest of the week for you and trying to land some of those guys that maybe haven't committed yet?
TYLER BARNES: That was an interesting recruitment. If you go back to May, April, May, even June, I think if anybody on our staff told you they felt good about that recruitment, they're lying to you. I think we were definitely on the outside looking in.
We were able to get him unofficially in the summer, which was huge. For us, there's a difference even with an in-state kid coming from unofficially to officially. Getting him here in June was huge. To be honest, I thought it started to turn back in August. He was here for an open practice. He was here for the Indiana game.
Probably when I got most confident and excited about everything, he went to the Iowa State game with his father. They bought their own tickets. His dad was an All-American sprinter at Iowa State. Xavier was extremely brave and wore an Iowa shirt to that game. For me right there, it's like we've got to be making headway here. After that Indiana game, he talked about setting up an official visit for Penn State.
I knew we were coming back into the picture a little more than people realized, but you never want to get too excited about a recruit, especially somebody the caliber of Xavier, just the status he's had in the state and around the country.
Fast forward to it. I felt pretty good about a month and a half, two months out. There were obviously some bumps in the road there, and Xavier is an incredible poker player because he doesn't give away anything, no tips to anybody, as well as his mom. Once we kind of got into it, me personally, I was really nervous when Notre Dame hired Marcus Freeman. I know they were really close. I thought we were right there at the finish line, and crazy coaching changes take place.
He did commit to our staff Monday night when they did an in home visit. Our staff and Xavier and his parents are evil people. They told them not to tell me about it. So they made me sweat it out for 48 more hours. I got tipped off on Wednesday by a couple people, and it made me feel good.
Until he actually said he was coming, you just never know. Recruiting is a wild and crazy world. A guy like that, that's what I really appreciate, he and his mom and the whole day through, I understand you've got this decision day in mind and it's great and we're going to wait for you, but the momentum he can create and just the power and pull he has with other peers. We can be the best recruiters in the country, but dudes want to play with dudes. When you have a guy like that who's got the reputation he has and the pull he has with kids, you can't replace that. You can't buy that in recruiting. That's huge.
There's no doubt he certainly had a part in helping us close out this class, there's no doubt about it. Selfishly, it would have been nice to have him in the boat a little bit earlier, but it is what it is. As a recruiting guy, it's always a big win. When you can be those blue blood programs you talk about, especially you keep a kid like that at home, that's huge no matter how you look at it, and we're extremely excited about him.
Q. Koen is sort of an interesting case to me because he's a soccer player mostly growing up. He didn't even play defense until this year. I think back to when you told us, I think, earlier in the year that it was kind of nice for you to be able to evaluate senior tape this year as opposed to last year. What really stuck out about Koen, and how did he come on your radar, and how did you end up securing his commitment? Because he was a very, very high riser late in the process.
TYLER BARNES: Koen was committed to Central Michigan. I actually saw Colorado offered him maybe about six weeks ago now. We have somebody in our office. Anybody in a six or seven hour radius, any Division I offer they get, we put together a list every single day, and that's handed out just to stay on top and make sure we're not missing any of those guys.
I saw Koen's name there. I popped on the phone, and within six clips, I texted Phil, you need to get down there and watch this kid. This kid's a little bit different. We were recruiting his teammate, who signed with Wisconsin today actually, about the same time. We had just offered his linebacker teammate Aidan Vaughan. It's funny because Aidan was the same way. Aidan was a guy who was committed to Air Force and didn't have many offers. Really blew up his senior year and ended up signing with Wisconsin ultimately today. But Koen is on the same team right behind him making plays.
With that, reached out to the kid. Got a little more background on him and talked to his high school coach. The more we learned about Koen and talked to him, the more we fell in love with the kid. He's an incredible kid, incredibly smart. He's got a chip on his shoulder. He attempted to play football his first -- or second year at his high school in Arizona. His high school coach told him he wasn't good enough and that he wasn't going to be able to play there.
Fast forward, he moves to Michigan. Goes to a school in Ann Arbor. They play him at receiver. He doesn't do a whole lot, and he finishes at Walled Lake Western where the coach saw his skill set and was like we're going to play you on both sides.
This is what he does on film. He's a big kid, all of 6'2", 205 pounds. He runs like the wind, great ball skills. Really smart for a second year football player, a football junkie. Then when you're around him, he's just got an infectious personality. He's a guy you really want to be around, you really like.
For some reason, Phil -- the way we recruit, I think Phil tried to talk him out of coming here just to see if he's a fit, what we're looking for. The kid had a really good relationship with Phil, a really good bond with him. Really had a good bond with the other DBs here, including Xavier.
It is good. You never know, when you get to watch senior film, see how guys develop, it could be a first year football player, could be a guy that's under recruited or under the radar for some reason. Koen is a great example, and we're certainly excited to have him in the fold.
Q. Wanted to ask you about Carson May and the process of finding a quarterback in this class because that's always an interesting journey. And flipping Kaleb Johnson. I know you guys were in on him early, and he commits to Cal and you get him back and how that process played out.
TYLER BARNES: Carson is a guy who popped on my radar just based on what he did in his junior year. He was putting up kind of PlayStation numbers down in Oklahoma, a guy who really didn't have a whole lot going on. Had a couple of smaller school offers. A guy we were talking to as the COVID dead period was coming to an end.
Got him up here to camp, did a really good job. Had offered a couple other quarterbacks before we offered him. We kind of gave them their time to see what they were going to do, and ultimately they went in a different direction. Coach O really liked his time working with Carson in camp here. Has an awesome family, really nice parents, good people. Big kid, a little bit over 6'4", 220 pounds. Looks like a tight end right now. Athletic kid, can really throw, can really run, and had a huge senior season this year too.
I think he's severely under recruited, and I'm not the only one. I talked to a few recruiting guys around the country when he committed to us, they were all giving us kudos. This kid is flying under the radar. Excited about Carson. He's a stoic, kind of quiet kid, but he's definitely a gamer. Fun to watch his film.
And Kaleb, we offered Kaleb when Coach Foster was here as our running backs coach early on. You can't teach size. Kaleb is 6'2", 225 pounds this past week on campus, and still got a 12 pack and a big kid. Very fluid on film. Some of the stuff he does, he's extremely fast. Really fluid for a big guy. Obviously can run through tackles and run through contact and is a good kid.
Initially, we were supposed to get him here in June. Didn't quite make it out, ended up committing to Cal. Kind of stayed on him. Obviously, our start to the season helped out in that recruitment there. Got him back unofficially for the Penn State game, and at that point, it was kind of over.
Really looking forward to getting him here. We haven't had a guy his size for some time here. It will be good to add a little size to that running back room.
Q. So with a good chunk of this recruiting happening over Zoom, how do you pitch kids on Iowa without them actually being on foot on campus?
TYLER BARNES: We've got a multitude of videos. Obviously, you're going to use Zoom and FaceTime to do facility tours and whatnot. I put together a pretty extensive presentation that we would kind of go over. It's about an hour, hour and 15 minutes with each kid and his family. Certainly we tailor that to where the kid is from and the position he plays and highlight any traditions or NFL guys, any success we've had at that position.
As Coach Ferentz said, it worked at the time, but it doesn't replace getting here. It doesn't replace getting around our guys and having player panels and being around our staff and having that interaction on a day-to-day basis.
But some of the stuff we did on Zoom and the virtual visits we'll continue to use moving forward just to grab a kid's attention early in the recruiting process before they get here officially or unofficially. It's something we'll use moving forward. I'm very glad we don't have a COVID dead period and we can get kids here on campus because it does make a huge difference. You're able to showcase so much more. That interaction, it can't be replaced by anything you do.
I think our staff did a really good job navigating those waters. Hopefully, we don't have to go back to that type of situation any time soon, but it affected everybody around the country. Various schools did different things, but I think our staff did a pretty good job overall just handling everything throughout that dead period.
Q. I wanted to ask you a couple of questions real quick. One is do you have any early enrollees? I know Xavier is one, but who else? Two, Caden Crawford was -- after Aaron Graves was the second guy to commit to you, and you're able to keep him. What does he bring to the program?
TYLER BARNES: As of right now, we have four guys who enrolled early. That number could grow. There's a couple guys kind of checking things out with their school, and we're working through that currently.
Three scholarship guys. Brian Allen, who just signed with us and committed today, Caden Crawford, who you just mentioned, and Xavier Nwankpa. And walk on candidate, Stevens. They're due to be here in January and will get rolling. There may be one or two guys after that. We're kind of working through some things.
Caden, he's kind of your typical -- when you look at some of the guys we've taken in years past who played defensive line for us or really anybody. You've got to be able to project. Caden never played D-line in high school. He was a high school quarterback and a high school linebacker. As productive as he could be on both sides of the ball. Tough kid, big kid, a little bit over 6'4", 245, 250 pounds right now. He's got a big frame. Comes from an extremely athletic family. Both parents are really good athletes. His sister is a volleyball player at Kansas. Had an uncle that played for the Kansas City Chiefs for a long time.
The blood lines were there, but just a lot of the same stuff we're looking for at really any position we're trying to evaluate. He played with an extremely high motor. He's a tough kid. He's productive. He runs well. He's going to be a projection on the D-line, but he's got all the tools in place and everything we're looking for. We felt good about him.
He was excited about us out of the gate. He kind of knew what we were about. He knew we had history and success projecting kids and developing kids all across the D-line. He was the second guy to raise his hand and jump on board. We're pretty happy he stuck through everything and excited to get him here in January.
Q. Back in the summer you made a public statement saying the amount of negative recruiting you heard over the last month was laughable. I was wondering, did that carry on all the way through up until today? What are you facing? You've obviously beaten it back, whatever it was.
TYLER BARNES: It never stops. It never stops. Obviously, our head coach has been here 23 years, the longest tenured head coach in the country. Everybody is going to talk about retirement. That's the first thing I always attack, and it's laughable. It is what it is.
We try and address whatever's been said. We try and address it with facts and history here and show the kids and the parents this isn't true. Some of the stuff is not even worth addressing because it's so terrible and just laughable. Most kids and parents understand that.
It's part of how schools, part of how some schools recruit. It is what it is. We don't get into that. We don't want to get into that. Any time we have to spend negative recruiting against another school is time we're taking away showcasing and talking about what Iowa football has to offer. It's not going to go away. It just is what it is, and we're not really too concerned about that. I probably shouldn't have tweeted that. I think a couple schools who were saying some stuff knew exactly what I was talking about.
We'll move on. We've got a couple of those guys, and joke's on them.
Q. I wanted to talk about one of the guys that you flipped, Brian Allen, who's coming in early, what was that process like with him? I know you guys had some hurdles you had to overcome with Jason Manson being at the school. What was that process like?
TYLER BARNES: Unfortunately for us, just getting everything cleared through NCAA didn't line up timing-wise like we had hoped. I think Brian's family had hoped. We kind of ran out of time there. But eventually we got things taken care of. When he opened things up, we felt good about where we were at in the process with him.
Obviously, and rightfully so, he garnered some more attention and some other offers, but just kind of stuck through it, through the long run. Kept swinging away on Brian, and we're glad he made a decision to be a Hawkeye. We felt pretty good about it the whole way through. Again, you never know, especially when some other schools come calling.
I think, even after his visit, he knew where he wanted to be. We had a couple hurdles we had to jump with the NCAA. We got it taken care of and done, and everything's good now. We're looking forward to getting him here in January.
Q. I wanted to ask about Aaron Graves, who's been committed since he was a 15-year-old freshman. Committed very quickly, and you never really had to worry about him. What jumps out to you about him? And what do you expect from him from day one coming on campus?
TYLER BARNES: First of all, that was a really good article you wrote. I thought it encapsulated what Aaron is about and his family and who he is as a person to a tee.
But Aaron, I wanted to offer Aaron after the first two games freshman year high school film. I had to be told to slow it down by our coaching staff, but it was easy to see. He never came off the field in those two games as a freshman. When you know how big he is, 6'5", 270 pounds, build like one of those Nike mannequins you see with a 12 pack, it was pretty easy. Then he came to camp, and it was real quick. It took ten minutes in camp to know what we had there.
He ended up calling coach a few days afterwards. Coach may have told this story. Doc, you hit it in your article there. Coach Ferentz offered them. Before the offer, Aaron said how do I commit? Just tell us you want to come, and that was that.
We knew he wanted to be a Hawkeye. We didn't think he was going to commit on the spot there. Everything you know about Aaron, right, incredibly smart kid, four sport athlete. Dominated on the basketball court and wrestling last year. First time wrestling, finished fourth in the state, which is pretty impressive in the state of Iowa. Obviously high school wrestling is pretty good in this state.
Just the way he operates. He doesn't have Twitter, that's his own choice. He's a little bit of a throwback, which doesn't happen very often with teenagers in this society. He doesn't stop. He doesn't take a play off. He's high motor. All out effort every single snap, which you just don't see a ton, especially for big guys. For Aaron, that's just how he plays, that's how he's wired. He's such a good kid from an awesome family.
He's the epitome of an Iowa Hawkeye. We're obviously thrilled to get him here. It's nice to have a guy commit that early. Probably the lowest maintenance recruit in the history of Iowa football. Didn't need much, didn't want much. Never post him on anything, just kind of how he operated.
Q. I wanted to ask about the transfer portal. It's probably more different than ever this year, maybe fuller than ever. You've got the no restrictions on transfers anymore. How does that change your approach, if at all? I know you've been a little more selective in the past, but curious if that's changed as you look in there.
TYLER BARNES: It has. We keep a board of transfers. We kind of have obviously our high school recruit board from different classes, and we have a board with transfers. I spent more time this year watching film on transfers than I have in my time working in football.
It's interesting because a lot of Power 5 guys, the top tier Power 5 guys, when they hit the portal, it's already done for the most part. They already know where they're going. And tampering, I heard coach say that today, it's 100 percent true. Most of these deals are done. It is college free agency, but it's not free agency because there are tampering rules in the NFL and punishments for those.
Like I said before, we try and really pay attention, those FCS schools, maybe some MAC schools, some of those schools where kids are hitting the portal because they know they can play at a higher level. We evaluate those guys on film first and foremost to see if they can contribute at this level. If we want to recruit those guys, we do the same as we would with high school recruits. We contact the coaches on the staff and see why they're leaving, make sure they're getting glowing remarks. We'll dig into the high school coach and really get to know the kid.
It's changed. Some schools are really going to live in the portal. It's fine. We're not going to live there. We're not going to sign ten guys out of the portal. If we have definitive needs or immediate needs, absolutely we'll look in there and identify those guys and help out those needs.
I still go back to, and I think Coach Ferentz agrees, it's pretty dangerous to build and sustain a team when you're taking 10 to 15 transfers a year because you have to keep replacing those guys. At some point there has to be development of your young guys and your high school kids.
At the end of the day, that's what we're about at Iowa football and we'll continue to be like that. We certainly have a more open eye to the transfer portal than we have in the past. It's not going anywhere any time soon. You're right, I think it's a record number. The last three months there have been a record number of guys entering the portal. The sad part is some of these kids are leaving situations that are probably much better for them currently than it's going to be in the future.
That's the hard part, when you see some of these kids left without spots. You wish they'd stick it out and try to earn their way wherever they're at because the grass isn't always greener. It's the same for us too. When we take a transfer kid, it's going to have repercussions on that position room, that unit.
We have to be incredibly smart and diligent on who we decide to bring in here. The same way we operate with high school recruits is exactly the same way with the transfer portal.
