College football earlier signing day is huge

High School Football Early Signing Day 2017: Culver City High School Alex Smith signs NLI with Wisconsin Badgers on December 20, 2017 at Culver City High School. (Photo by Jevone Moore)

National Letter of Intent Signing Day has come and gone for the new early signing period. Power 5 conferences and smaller conferences have loaded up on high school and junior college players.

Only basketball and football are the only two sports to have seperate early signing periods that last for 3 days.

Now this being the second year of having early signing day that was held December 19 – December 21. Kids realize if you are not the super elite 5 star athlete you need commit ‘Now’ and not hold out for a bigger school offer that may not come.

Last year saw a handful mid-level talented players not have scholarships held for regular signing period. Once a school signs players at your position they have moved on and will coach up the players they have signed already.

In the PAC-12 this year California Golden Bears signed the biggest class with 25 signinees during this period. Safe to say if you wanted to go to Cal you should have signed now.

California Bears 1st year head coach Justin Wilcox (Photo by Jevone Moore)

“We’re really excited about this group,” said Cal coach Justin Wilcox, “They’re going to fit into the locker room and what we’re all about.”

Inside the Numbers

PAC-12                            SEC                          Mountain West

  • CAL                  25       Florida            20           Air Force           52*
  • Oregon             22       Georgia           21           Boise St            15
  • Oregon St         19       Kentucky         21          Colorado St        15
  • Stanford           23       Missouri           22          New Mexico        18
  • Washington       20       S. Carolina       18          Utah St              14
  • Washington St   19       Tennessee        17          Wyoming           18
  • Arizona             20       Vanderbilt        19           Fresno St          13
  • Arizona St         17       Alabama          22           Hawai’i              13
  • Colorado           17       Arkansas          20           Nevada             21
  • UCLA                14       Auburn             15           San Diego St     13
  • USC                  18       LSU                 19           San Jose St       14
  • Utah                  12      Ole Miss           25           UNLV                15
  •                                   Mississippi St    14
  •                                   Texas A&M        22

*Air Force players sign Certificate of Intent vs Letter of Intent and are not binding.

“This group of playmakers makes us all excited about what we’re doing for the future,” says Brent Brennan, who is entering his third season as San Jose State University’s head football coach.

Colleges across the US sign 48,000 NLI, worth more than 3.3 Billion in Athletic Scholarships across 657 Div I, Div II and NLI member schools in all sports.

Let’s stay tune for the regular signing day on February 6, 2019 for the schools who held on too a few scholarships.