National Signing Day has come and gone, and the NC State football team ended the day with 27 new recruits, 23 of whom will play under a scholarship.
Many of these new Wolfpack players participated with successful teams, with 19 of them making the playoffs, eight of them advancing to the championship game and four of them winning the championship. Additionally, many of the players individually had successful high school careers, as 12 participated in All-Star games, nine earned All-State honors, six were invited to the Shrine Bowl and five were team captains for their respective teams.
“I’ve always talked about how recruiting winners was really important,” head coach Dave Doeren said.
The Pack recruited players from eight different states: 13 from North Carolina, three from Florida, Georgia and Virginia, two from South Carolina and one from Illinois, New Jersey and Missouri.
“My staff and assistant coaches did a great job working guys throughout the country,” Doeren said. “Our coaches battled hard, and I feel like we’ve done things the right way. It is important for us to recruit in-state, but also get some from our target states such as Florida and Georgia.”
NC State recruited players from every position except running back and defensive end, which both currently have ample depth on the roster. The class includes one quarterback, three wide receivers, four tight ends, three offensive tackles, four offensive linemen, one defensive tackle, three linebackers, four cornerbacks, two safeties and one kicker.
“We wanted to continue to build competitive depth,” Doeren said.
Additionally, 12 of these players are 6 feet 4 inches or taller.
“We wanted to get longer at some positions,” Doeren said. “Height and wingspan are very important. It’s hard to coach height and length, so that’s something we focused on.”
However, as it has done in years past, the Wolfpack coaching staff would prefer to redshirt as many players as possible, despite the confidence in the talent it has in its new recruiting class.
“You wanna fight the urge to be young, you want that experience to pay off. Some of these guys are going to be able to come in here and compete, it’s just [a matter of] what percentage. Out of the 22 guys coming in on scholarship, it’s been about 10 a year that we’ve played. If we could get it closer to five or six, that would be better.”
According to ESPN, the top-ranked recruit is tight end Thaddeus Moss, son of former NFL wide receiver and soon-to-be Hall of Famer Randy Moss. The younger Moss caught 54 passes for 831 yards and 13 touchdowns at Mallard Creek High School, and had some of the highlight-reel catches that resembled his father’s talent.
“Coming from his pedigree, he knows a lot about football,” Doeren said. “He’s another guy who could’ve gone to a lot of different places but chose to stay home and build something special. Anytime you get a coach’s son or a player’s son, you get the intangibles that are hard to come by.”
The team didn’t hide the fact that its biggest needs were offensive line and defensive back, as it brought in seven and six players from each position group respectively.
“We redshirted some guys the past few years, but we still had three starters graduate, so it was important that we address the position,” Doeren said. “We added four corners, three of which were over 6 feet 1 inch, and two taller safeties that are rangy. We felt like that was a very important part of what we’re going to do, make plays on longer receivers.”
Other notable recruits include quarterback Dylan Parham, wide receivers C.J. Riley and Kelvin Harmon, tight end Bryce Dixon, offensive tackle Justin Witt, defensive tackle Ben “Shug” Frazier, cornerbacks James Valdez and Nick McCloud and safety Isaiah Stallings.
