Prospects 2018

[Ruckus2]

LB Connor Shugart announcing his commitment in 30 mins.
WTFan, you tuning in? We going to land him?

[Atldog7]

North Greenville???

[Ruckus2]

Appears so. Oh well.
Wish him the best of luck.
Guess he wants to be a Baptist minister. Or unemployed in 4 years.
Didn’t see that coming.

[Retiredterrier]

Yes wish him the best. At least he did not go to FU. But still disappointing. He seemed a perfect SHD

[OlRB#3]

This is a head scratcher. NG over Wofford and FU? Passing up quality division 1 programs to play at an average division 2? Wish the kid the best but can’t see how that make sense.

[youngterrier]

Y'all don't know the thinking of spartanburg county kids

[WTFan]

Yes, definitely a head scratcher. I do not know the kid's plans but have to believe he is interested in the ministry beyond football to choose NGU over all of the other offers he had. Maybe we should have made him aware of all the esteemed pastors and clergymen that are Wofford graduates. At least we didn't overlook him, he apparently overlooked us. He was as good as any I've ever seen at his position in high school and would have made a fine SHD but there were obviously other factors at play with Shugart it seems. Wish him the best.

[Ruckus2]

WR/LB/S Jonny Fritz from St. Cloud Fla has decommitted per a tweet from his coach.

[lawdog]

Don't like that. Hopefully as with past signing days, we will sign some excellent talent that has not earlier been known about or discussed here; we have gotten many of our best players this way, e.g., Miles Brown.

[lawdog]

Yes, definitely a head scratcher. I do not know the kid's plans but have to believe he is interested in the ministry beyond football to choose NGU over all of the other offers he had. Maybe we should have made him aware of all the esteemed pastors and clergymen that are Wofford graduates. At least we didn't overlook him, he apparently overlooked us. He was as good as any I've ever seen at his position in high school and would have made a fine SHD but there were obviously other factors at play with Shugart it seems. Wish him the best.

If he attends seminary, he likely will be studying texts written by Wofford grads! There is still time for him to make the wiser choice.

[drpnut]

The Shugart kids decision is not that big of a head scratcher for me. By all accounts he is a young man of evangelical faith. So if that is the most important thing for him then he would not choose a liberal bastion like Furman or Wofford. And although NGC is not on par with the academics of Woffy, Furman or PC it is by no means a shabby education.
And if he ends up being good enough to play pro the NFL will find him like they did Freddie Marino who was on TB’s active roster this year.

Although, I wish he had signed with us I applaud the young man stating true to his convictions even in the face of criticism.

[Ruckus2]

NGU is not even close to being on par with us. A glorified high school.
Which is fine, like I said, if he wants to be a Baptist minister.
But I am not sure why it is perceived apparently by some that attending wofford (or FU or PC) somehow compromises one’s faith v NGU. I know for a fact Wofford offers many groups and experiences which are designed to grow and enrich a student’s faith. A liberal arts education is not secular or non-Christian. Wofford is a Methodist supported achool for goodness sake. And if the perception is NGU students don’t endulge in the “extracurricular elements of college life”, that is sadly naive. That is one of the good things about Wofford IMO - you can find pretty much whatever flavor of belief you prefer. But make no mistake, Wofford is a Christian-based institution and while not evangelical necessarily, it is a place where conservative leaning students feel more than at home. I am sure some would argue Woofrd leans more evangelical than FU for instance.
BTW - He will NOT be playing in the NFL regardless where he goes.

[youngterrier]

I'm not going to go into a political diatribe, but some thought on the above few posts:

1) NGU may not be a party school, but that's partially because it's a commuter school. They party in the boonies.

2) Wofford may be a liberal arts school, but the term is void of context. There's not been much change in the demographic recruitment of students (there has been some, but not earth-shaking) since 57% of the polled student body voted for Romney in 2012 (I think they did a straw poll for 2016 and the results were pretty similar). If you know anything about the trends of how young people vote, that is earth-shakingly conservative relative to other institutions.

3) There are at least 3 campus ministries at Wofford that draw 25+ people for weekly fellowship. Outside of Campus Union and Greek Life, that's unheard of.

Summary of point 2 and 3: Anyone who thinks Wofford isn't a culturally conservative and Christian friendly campus on the student side just hasn't been paying attention. Though it's true the faculty are predominately liberal, that's par the course for today's higher education. I'd argue Wofford is better than the average, or even the liberal arts average. The conservative faculty aren't shy.


As I said in a previous comment: some of y'all just don't understand how people From Greenville, Spartanburg, Union and Cherokee County think. I'm not going to knock NGU. It's a good school that does what it aims to do. Having said that, the sticker price of Wofford is like 175% of what the median household of these counties make a year. Put simply, part of the reason why there's not the same connection to Wofford as with other local universities is because we cast a wide (and not very dense) net in the southeast to convince about 400 students each year to come to Wofford. Our target student is not Spartanburg county and I don't think it ever has been. I'm not going to list the core competencies as a university, but theological (not to be confused with religious studies) education is not one of them. There are more students in any given senior biology class than there are Religious Studies majors.

North Greenville doesn't do that. They target upstate kids, not as academically rigorous, more religious kids more commuters, etc etc.

The consequence is you have any given kid in these counties know a dozen people who went to NGU, and 2-3 at bear maximum who went to Wofford. Of the 5% or so of students who could it cut at Wofford academically, the sticker price deters them from even applying.

There are far-reaching consequences for this in the immediate future and long term, but I wouldn't say it's a threat quite yet. Either way, I think a better way of understanding why this kid didn't pick us is because we clearly went after him *after* we lost another linebacker. We clearly sent the message that he was not our first choice, while NGU had been with him for a while. Anyone who's recruited anyone, whether it be Greek Life or otherwise could tell you that it's hard to beat someone's preference when you arrive late, give them the impression that you're not as important, while someone else has been doing the opposite.

[Ruckus2]

I am not at all sure early interest mattered to his decision: FU was his first offer in May.

[youngterrier]

I am not at all sure early interest mattered to his decision: FU was his first offer in May.

to that end I'm curious why he went with NGU but I'm not surprised at all he didn't go our way given our lack of interest.