Boston College Football Recruiting: 2014 Class Offer Breakdown

National Signing Day went pretty well for Steve Addazio and the Boston College football team. In all, the program brought in 30 new players -- 28 high school recruits and two Florida grad transfers -- a huge class per BC's standards. The rankings seem to back this up.

Rivals ranked Boston College as the 42nd-best recruiting class in the nation; 8th in the conference. 247Sports ranked the class 52nd best and 11th in the conference, while Scout ranks the class 57th and 12th in the ACC. For what it's worth, the major difference between Rivals and 247Sports/ESPN is that the latter two don't credit BC with having any four-star recruits in this class. Rivals considers Hilliman, Landry and Strachan all four-star prospects.

Still, for a program ranked dead last in recruiting a year ago and one that won all of two games in a season just two years ago, recruiting is certainly trending upward.

More than stars and class rankings, I always find it informative to look at the head-to-head recruiting battles. What programs did BC beat out for players this past recruiting cycle, and which programs drank Addazio's milkshake?

Using Rivals database of offers, I looked at two things:

1) Where do guys with Boston College offers end up? Who is beating Boston College on the players they offered?
2) On other schools' offer lists, how many players ended up at BC? Who did BC beat for players?

Disclaimer: This isn't perfect by any means. Offers are temporal in nature. One day a player has them; the next it's gone and the program's leadership has completely turned over.

Let's see how Boston College fared against some other programs:

ACC

Program	Conference	Committed Elsewhere	Committed to BC	Difference
N.C. State Wolfpack	ACC	3	4	1
Duke Blue Devils	ACC	1	1	0
Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets	ACC	2	2	0
Syracuse Orange	ACC	3	3	0
Clemson Tigers	ACC	2	1	(1)
Virginia Cavaliers	ACC	3	2	(1)
Florida St. Seminoles	ACC	3	1	(2)
Louisville Cardinals	ACC	2	0	(2)
North Carolina Tar Heels	ACC	4	2	(2)
Miami Hurricanes	ACC	5	2	(3)
Pittsburgh Panthers	ACC	5	2	(3)
Wake Forest Demon Deacons	ACC	5	2	(3)
Virginia Tech Hokies	ACC	5	0	(5)

-- Boston College recruited about even with N.C. State, Duke, Georgia Tech and Syracuse, but was down big vs. Pitt, Wake Forest and Virginia Tech. The losses to Pitt and Wake Forest are a bit surprising relative to where each class finished in the national rankings.

-- Virginia Tech was the only ACC school to sweep BC this year. This time last year, there were several ACC programs to accomplish the feat.

-- In all, 43 recruits holding BC offers went elsewhere in the ACC, though BC recruits held 22 offers from other ACC schools. That's up significantly year over year.

American

Program	Conf	Committed Elsewhere	Committed to BC	Difference
Connecticut Huskies	American	0	6	6
South Florida Bulls	American	0	3	3
Central Florida Knights	American	0	2	2
Cincinnati Bearcats	American	1	2	1
East Carolina Pirates	American	1	1	0
SMU Mustangs	American	1	0	(1)

-- What a difference a year makes. Last year, BC recruited UConn about even. This year, Addazio -- a former Connecticut state high school coach -- cleaned up in the Constitution State. I suspect UConn's disastrous 2013 season and subsequent coaching change had a lot to do with that, but if you're BC, you're feeling pretty good about your recruiting efforts in CT. Of note, BC is already on the board in 2015 with the verbal commitment of four-star OT Anthony Palazzolo (Fairfield Prep).

-- The rest of the conference breaks down as you would expect. It will be interesting to see how conference realignment continues to impact recruiting battles, but we may already be seeing the impact here.

-- The three recruits that went elsewhere were ATH JayJay Pinckney (Cincinnati), WR Curtis Burston (East Carolina) and WR Kadeem Goulbourne (SMU).

Big Ten

Program	Conf	Committed Elsewhere	Committed to BC	Difference
Rutgers Scarlet Knights	Big Ten	1	5	4
Purdue Boilermakers	Big Ten	0	1	1
Illinois Fighting Illini	Big Ten	1	1	0
Nebraska Cornhuskers	Big Ten	2	2	0
Iowa Hawkeyes	Big Ten	1	0	(1)
Minnesota Golden Gophers	Big Ten	1	0	(1)
Indiana Hoosiers	Big Ten	3	1	(2)
Michigan Wolverines	Big Ten	4	1	(3)
Northwestern Wildcats	Big Ten	3	0	(3)
Maryland Terrapins	Big Ten	5	1	(4)
Wisconsin Badgers	Big Ten	5	1	(4)
Ohio St. Buckeyes	Big Ten	8	3	(5)
Michigan St. Spartans	Big Ten	8	2	(6)
Penn St. Nittany Lions	Big Ten	14	1	(13)

-- What a difference a year makes, part II. This time last year, BC lost the head-to-head with Rutgers 6-2. This year, BC won 5-1, including flipping four-star running back Jonathan Hilliman (St. Peter's Prep, Jersey City).

-- What sanctions? Once again, Penn State crushes BC on the recruiting trail. Last year it was a 7-0 beatdown. This year, 14-1. Apparenly over half the Nittany Lions recruiting class held BC offers. That's nuts.

-- Losing to Maryland 5-1 is a bit surprising, especially when most recruiting services ranked BC's class higher than Maryland's.

-- Boston College has really struggled to compete with Big Ten programs on the recruiting trail over the past few years and this one was no exception. There is some improvement, however. Last year, BC lost the head-to-head with the Big Ten (and Maryland and Rutgers) 59 to 3. This year, that record was down to 56-19. Still a long way to go.

MAC

Program	Conf	Committed Elsewhere	Committed to BC	Difference
UMass Minutemen	MAC	1	10	9
Western Michigan Broncos	MAC	0	3	3
Buffalo Bulls	MAC	0	2	2
Ohio Bobcats	MAC	0	2	2
Toledo Rockets	MAC	0	2	2
Ball St. Cardinals	MAC	0	1	1
Central Michigan Chippewas	MAC	0	1	1
Eastern Michigan Eagles	MAC	0	1	1
Kent St. Golden Flashes	MAC	0	1	1
Miami (Ohio) RedHawks	MAC	0	1	1
Northern Illinois Huskies	MAC	1	1	0

-- Even Spaz managed to troll the MAC, so it should come as no surprise that Addazio and staff continued that trend this season.

-- Two star LB Joshua Smiley (Pomfret School, Pomfret, Connecticut) was the only recruit who claimed a BC offer that committed to UMass. A total of 10 Boston College commits held UMass offers. Last season, the margin was much smaller -- just 2-0 BC. Build that fence, Addazio.

-- A year ago, the final BC vs. #MACtion tally was just 10-3. This year, that has ballooned to 25-2. In addition to Smiley, Florida DB Deion Hallmon was the only other MAC commit to claim a BC offer. Hallmon committed to Northern Illinois.

The Rest

-- 0-6 vs. Notre Dame. Was 0-9 a year ago. Progress?

-- Even with the Pac-12 at 4-4. BC recruits held offers from Arizona, Cal, UCLA and Oregon, while Oregon, Arizona State, Stanford and Utah commits claimed a BC offer.

-- Lost to Florida 4-1, but when you consider the additions of Tyler Murphy and Ian Silberman ...