Rising to the Top - Part II

Yesterday I posted the top 20 schools as they rated in signing 4 & 5 star recruits since 2003, which would have made them 5th year seniors in 2007. Now I've thrown away the 2003 class and counted 2008 and the numbers look like this.
(1) USC 79
(2) FLORIDA 77
(3) FSU 75
(4) LSU 71
(5) OKLAHOMA 66
(6) GEORGIA 63
(7) TEXAS 62
(7) MIAMI 62
(9) MICHIGAN 59
(10) OHIO ST. 54
(10) ALABAMA 54
(12) TENNESSEE 52
(13) NOTRE DAME 49
(14) AUBURN 46
(15) CLEMSON 37
(16) S. CAROLINA 36
(17) PENN ST. 35
(17) CALIFORNIA 35
(19) NEBRASKA 34
(20) TEXAS A&M 33

As a point of reference, I'll include these teams that finished in the top 10 on the field; Missouri 14, WVA 7, Kansas 5.

I'll say it again, these are not the numbers on the actual rosters. Some have graduated, jumped to the NFL, and some never made it to school. UGA for example has 51 of the 63 players on it's 2008 roster. 11 of the missing players have used their eligibility and 1 never made it to campus. Maybe I'll track down the actual players on each team's roster in the future, cuz it's gonna be a boring summer.

There's several ways of breaking down the information on this list. Do you need a ton of highly rated recruits to compete? What does it mean when the super talented teams under perform? Why don't the top 10 on the list equal the top 10 in the rankings? I'm just going to look at one for right now - How many good players does a team need to compete at the highest level?

To get a handle on that question, let's look at the number of players that actually see the field in an important, hard-fought game....no blowouts......special teams don't count.....just offense and defense.....and make it a conference game, just to make sure that no holds are barred.

My three models from 2007 are UGA vs Florida, USC vs Oregon, and LSU vs Auburn.
UGA used 52 players
Florida 51
USC 53
Oregon 47
Auburn 49
LSU 48

45 looks like a good solid number to slug it out with the big boys. These don't have to be 4 or 5 star players (although that doesn't hurt), just solid D-1A players. Having more than that doesn't seem to matter, since only 50 or so are going to play. Having less.....you may be in trouble.

Tomorrow, I'll try to put out the list of UGA players that will likely have legitimate playing time in the close ones.