Boston College To Benefit From Penn State Sanctions

In case you missed it, some players will be leaving Happy Valley before the fall begins for happier valleys or happier heights. There are no done deals yet, but the athletic department did confirm to me today that the football staff is interested in several Penn State players. At this point it is hard to speculate who the main targets are since there are so many factors involved that would lead to a player leaving Penn State for BC.

We know Spaz has scholarships available and we know that we lack depth all over the field so I am optimistic we might get a little unexpected help to our roster in the near future. Earlier, over two dozen current Penn State players pledged to continue to play out their eligibility at Penn State. That still leaves another 60 or so players plus some more future recruits still likely undecided and probably up for grabs if the correct school shows enough interest.

While it is safe to assume that any coach who has any connection to any current Penn State player might be looking to bring on some current PSU players, Illinois has been the most public in their interest of Penn State players so far. It will be interesting to see if there is ultimately any negative backlash for recruiting players away from a team within your own league. If this were baseball, the game of unwritten rules, one or two unwritten rules would almost certainly be broken for every Penn State player that ends up at another Big Ten school. If it were me, just to be safe though, I would transfer to a school outside the league so I don't have to see Penn State on the field in 2012 while wearing the opposing team's uniform.

Penn State and BC often recruit the same areas including New York, New Jersey, and Ohio. If you are a current high school football player looking to play college football somewhere in the northeast, how much more attractive has BC become compared to some other schools without doing anything themselves this offseason? UConn and Rutgers are taking a big hit because the Big East is seemingly being left out of the new BCS format and now Penn State is really going to struggle to recruit for at a very minimum, the next two seasons. Now, for a recruit looking to play big time college football who is somewhat geographically limited, BC might really only have to compete with Syracuse and Pitt due to conference realignment and now the Penn State sanctions. Even if BC does not land any Penn State players in the next month or so, BC undoubtedly stands to be one of the larger beneficiaries from the Penn State sanctions outside of the Big Ten.