The NCAA Baseball Tournament projection picture changed slightly this week following that success by the Big Red.
The flurry of phone activity that began the morning of the first day of the NFL draft ceased, at least momentarily. The televisions inside the draft room at Halas Hall were already turned down. Other conversations died down.
The Bears were on hold. All 20 eyes in the room fixated on the black landline phone on the desk of Joey Laine, Chicago’s director of football administration.
We see peaks and valleys when it comes to the number of commitments happening during a typical recruiting cycle. Over the last year we saw some huge spikes in the numbers as prospects were gobbling up preferred spots. They had to do this in large part without visiting college campuses. Coaches accepted those commitments without meeting players in person in some cases.