CHEYENNE, WYO. — New Wyoming coach Dave Christensen’s first recruiting class brought in players almost exclusively from the high school ranks and landed players from Oklahoma, Missouri, Texas and Illinois.
Christensen’s 22 recruits join two others who had signed last year under former coach Joe Glenn. Wednesday was the first day of the national signing period for college football.
Christensen says he and his staff put a lot of emphasis on adding athleticism and speed in their recruiting effort.
“The most important criteria for us, we want to recruit guys that are athletic and can run and we can project to be able to play at a certain position for us,” he said.
His 22 recruits covered all positions, including two quarterbacks.
Glenn, who was fired Nov. 23 after four losing seasons in six years, had trouble finding a reliable starting quarterback, shuffling through all four quarterbacks on the roster last season.
Despite four quarterbacks left over from Glenn’s team, Christensen added junior college transfer Robert Benjamin out of Phoenix Community College and signed Austyn Carta-Samuels from Bellarmine College Prep in San Jose, Calif.
“Obviously we think that they possess the intangibles to come in here and run the type of offense we want to run, our spread system,” he said.
The other four quarterbacks on the roster will be evaluated this spring to see how they do in the new system, Christensen said.
Benjamin was the only junior college transfer among Christensen’s recruits. The rest are out of high school.
Asked to name a recruit he was most surprised to land because of competition from other schools, Christensen cited Carta-Samuels, who received about two dozen offers.
“He’s probably the most heavily recruited of the bunch,” he said. “But again we’re not interested in stars and rankings and that stuff. We’re interested in guys that are athletic and come in here and compete and compete at this level to challenge for a Mountain West championship.” Defensive lineman Spencer Bruce of Gillette was the only recruit from Wyoming. Christensen lured Bruce away from a verbal commitment the 6-foot-5, 215-pounder had made earlier to Southern Miss.
Christensen signed five players from Colorado, three each from Texas and Illinois and two each from California, Missouri and Oklahoma.
Colorado, because of its proximity to Wyoming and larger population, is “always going to be a very, very important spot for us,” he said.
Christensen, who came to Wyoming from Missouri, where he was offensive coordinator, said there isn’t much difference recruiting players to Wyoming and Missouri because the process of establishing relationships and evaluating players is the same.
