Coach Pasqualoni Reviews the 2001 Recruiting Class
2/7/2001 11:16:44 AM | Football
Syracuse University Head Football Coach
Signing Day Press Conference
February 7, 2001
Overall comments about the 2001 recruiting class:
"Overall, we had a certain number of people we could take and a certain number at each position we could take. For example, at cornerback we wanted two if we could get two. I think this is a very good class. The staff put in a lot of effort. Jerry Azzinaro coordinated things, and I think it came out very well."
On linebacker Cory Brooks:
"Cory is a tailback who (current SU assistant) Steve Bush coached in his high school career so we couldn't have a better evaluation. He's 6-2, 215 pounds and was a great tailback. Those are the guys we want to have come in and play Will linebacker for us. I don't think it is any different than the projection of J.R. Johnson who was a great tailback at Cicero-North Syracuse. We bring him in here and now he's a fabulous will linebacker. We couldn't be more excited to have a 6-2, 215-pound tailback come in here. He had a lot of options toward the end of the recruiting season, but fortunately, he made a commitment here."
Overall comments about cornerback Steve Gregory:
"We felt we needed to sign a corner in this group. We're excited about Steve Gregory. In our opinion, he is by far the best skill athlete in the State of New York. He was tremendous on offense. He has great athleticism, and we believe he has a chance to be an excellent corner."
On defensive end Tommy Harris:
"Tommy Harris is a knowledgeable player who comes from an outstanding high school program (Daytona Beach, FL/Atlantic H.S.). He is an outstanding prospect. He will come in here and be very comfortable with what we're doing."
Overall comments about quarterback Cecil Howard:
"We're excited to have Cecil come and join the program. In our evaluation, I would put Cecil as the best quarterback prospect within a five-hour radius over the past several years. He has great potential. We're going to be realistic in our expectations of him, but we are going to try to do as much as we can do, as much as the rules will allow, between now and the time he gets here."
On Cecil Howard:
"Cecil is an eager guy, a great kid. He is a good student so we don't have to fool around with SATs or a math class. That stuff is all taken care of. We think he has chance to be an all-around type of player who fits very well into what we're doing."
Comparing Cecil Howard to past SU quarterbacks in the recruiting process:
"Let's go back to Marvin Graves. It was little tough to evaluate Marvin on a few things because it wasn't part of his offense. When we evaluated Donovan, the knock on him was that he couldn't throw the ball because he was in a run-oriented offense that didn't have a lot of dropback passes. We saw enough where we thought we could develop those dropback skills. I think it is similar with Cecil, although a lot of people were willing to go in there and offer him a scholarship. What you can see on the films in comparison with Marvin and Donovan is that his option techniques and abilities are way more advanced than anybody we've ever had come in here. That's just one part of our offense. There is certainly evidence, as there was with Marvin and Donovan, that he can throw the ball. I don't care who the quarterback is there are certain fundamental skills that a quarterback has to learn and develop in order to become a good passer. Cecil is going to have to go through that process, and continue to go through it just like every other quarterback. We're going to get started on those things right away."
On Cecil Howard's option ability contributing immediately:
"There are a lot of things that have to go into it. How comfortable is he going to be? How well is he going to be able to handle the huddle? Those are things that we can project, but we won't to be able to make accurate decisions on until he's here and he practices and scrimmages. He's such an intelligent and competitive kid and has great communication skills. If someone's going to have a chance, it would be Cecil."
On Cecil Howard's passing ability:
"You can see an awful lot on the film. You can see enough to see that he has what I would put in the category of a very strong arm."
On evaluating high school quarterbacks:
"In this day and age we are looking for the mobile guy, the guy who can be a great athlete, but we're also looking for a guy who can throw the ball down the field. We're looking for the quarterback that everybody in America is looking for. It doesn't matter if you're in the National Football League or Division I, you want that real athletic guy. Defenses seem faster and more aggressive than they've ever been so we want a guy who is athletic and can make plays. He has to be a superior athlete. That's the type of quarterback we've had success with in my years. I think Cecil Howard has a chance to do those things."
On defensive end Ryan LaCasse:
"Ryan is another guy, like Wyche, who is an exceptional track guy. To me, these guys are the type of defensive end in a 4-3 system that you absolutely want to recruit. With the job description of our defensive ends, I don't know if we're going to sign a prospect with greater potential than Ryan LaCasse."
Overall comments about cornerback Larry McClain:
"Larry is by trade one of the outstanding corner prospects in the East this year. I don't know if you're going to sign a better corner than Larry McClain. I haven't seen one on film."
On Larry McClain's height:
"Well, we'd love for every corner to be 6-2, but we've had guys like Kevin Abrams, who at 5-9 was unbelievable. Larry McClain can do it at 5-10."
On tight end Alex Shor:
"Alex Shor is a tight end who is going to have a chance grow into a big, outstanding player."
On plackicker Justin Sujansky:
"Justin is a guy who specializes in the field goal end of things. He is a very competitive and extremely hard working person. It gives us one more option from a field goal standpoint. He's a competitive son of a gun."
On the line prospects:
"I'm really like the linemen we've signed. You are always struggling to find big, athletic guys who can play on defense. I think Tim Carignan is going to have a chance to have an excellent career here. We had Kader Drame from from Wilbur Cross High School in New Haven, CT in our camp here. Both Tim and Kader committed to us early, and made it very clear to everyone that they were going to come here. It is the same story on the offensive side with Jason Greene, who is very athletic, and Jared Pierce, who was a highly-recruited guy. He is an excellent basketball player, and has great body control for a guy 280 pounds. I was very impressed watching him play."
"We are always going to be building the inside big guys on defense and the big athletic guys on offense. What I like about Pierce and Jason Greene is that they're athletic enough to play on defense they're going to play offense but they're athletic enough to play defense. What I love about Carignan and Drame is that they are big defensive guys who are very athletic. If we could find more of those type of guys we'd take them. My problem, and everybody else's problem in football, is finding those guys."
On the defensive ends and linebackers:
"The defensive ends and linebackers are a talented group. James Wyche is a special kind of guy in the fact that he is a 6-5, 220-pound defensive end, but he also is a 100-meter runner on the track team. A guy who is 6-5 and weighs 220 pounds and runs an 11-flat 100-meters is unique. He is very explosive and very aggressive, and was highly recruited."
On the enrolled players impact on spring practice:
"We're very excited to sign these 18 players. I think it is a unique group in that four of them are already on campus. All four, Thump Belton, Jose Harris, Julian Pollard and Billy Wilson, are impresive kids. They have already shown excellent athleticism in the off-season strength and conditioning program. They give us a chance to have four more quality players in spring practice. I know that doesn't sound like a lot, but when you only have 85 on scholarship and you lose about 20 per class that means the average Division I program goes into spring practice with 65 players. This year we're headed into spring ball with 72, which is really a big number in I-A football. These four are going to add to our depth."
On fullback Thump Belton:
"Thump made a commitment early on to come here. Thump could be at Auburn, getting ready to play against us. He is going to have a chance to come here and have a great career as a fullback."
On linebacker Jose Harris:
"I don't know if there is a more impressive looking candidate to play the linebacker position than Jose Harris. At 6-4, 225 pounds, when you look at him he is a very impressive guy.
On defensive end Julian Pollard:
"Julian Pollard was a highly recruited guy a year ago. I think it shows his character that after he had to sit out he could have jumped back into recruiting in a heartbeat, but he didn't."
On linebacker Billy Wilson:
"Billy Wilson looks like a young Dan Conley-type of player to me."
On the outside analysis of Syracuse's recruiting class:
"My thoughts are that our staff really likes this group. In four years, we'll know exactly what kind of class it is. The important thing is that we go off our evaluations and not anybody else's. When you look at guys like Carignan and Drame, those kids were in our camp. We coached those kids. They're high character kids. They committed to us early so they didn' take any other visits. They could've taken a ton of visits, but they didn't. It is the same thing with Steve Gregory. He committed to us, stuck by his guns and didn't take any other visits. You can go through this list and see a lot of these kids didn't visit a lot of other schools. Well, there's a reason they didn't visit a lot of schools. Our understanding is that we make a commitment to them and they make a commitment to us. The bottom line is that I worry more about how we feel about them than how others feel about them, and we feel great."
On comparing this recruiting class to past classes:
"I would say this is as athletic and solid of a group as we've signed. The only way to evaluate it is to wait four years. That's all I can say. My sense tells me in four years that this group will be evaluated higher than some groups in recent years. I really believe that. They're high character guys, and in the end, you usually win big with character."
On filling the quarterbacks coach position:
"We have one more position to hire, and as we get that last person on board, we'll make an announcement as to how we're going to handle it. We're in the interview process this week, so we have to wait until we make that hire."
