Calm Luginbill Thinks SDSU’s Prospects Are Good

Al Luginbill came around from behind his desk and sat in an easy chair. He leaned back and crossed his legs. The telephone was 10 feet away, and it was quiet.

I expected to encounter an atmosphere of electric anticipation, if not downright frenzy, on the Tuesday before America’s finest high school football prospects cast their lots with the universities of their choices.

Luginbill, nearing the end of his third recruiting campaign as San Diego State’s head coach, was at peace on this day. His work, in essence, had been done.

He knew whom he thought he was getting, but he could not talk about them or identify them or even even evaluate them. These are not things a coach can do until he has tucked the letters of intent into his filing cabinet. Until today, they remain in his hope chest.

What he did know, to be sure, was what he expected from these young men. He knows what to expect because of how they were evaluated.

Luginbill’s philosophy is quite simple. You recruit according to whom you have to beat.

“You evaluate young men according to whether they can beat the personnel from the best team you have on your schedule year in and year out,” Luginbill said. “That team is the University of Miami. And we don’t want to just compete with them. We want people who can beat them.”

These kids, today’s prospects, are not, of course, expected to be the guys who go back to Miami next fall and take the wind out of the Hurricanes. These kids will watch and wait and learn and then their time will come.

“We are not worried about who else is recruiting a kid or what his high school statistics might be,” Luginbill said. “We ask, ‘Does he project to be a player who can have an impact as a redshirt sophomore in his third year?’ If the answer is yes, we recruit him. If the answer is no, we won’t.”

SDSU football is on track to beat a Miami or UCLA or Brigham Young or maybe, someday, all three. The season finale last fall, that 30-28 loss to Miami, was more a measure of where this program is going than where it is at.

This is a big day for the program, because today’s recruits will play such a big role in taking the Aztecs from heartbreaking losses to heartwarming wins. This university is not that far from going over the top to the top.

I pulled out a list of players expected to commit to San Diego State. It’s an impressive list, maybe one of the best top to bottom recruiting classes in the program’s history. A few big names have been picked off in the past, such as the Patrick Rowe, Tommy Booker, Scott Barrick Class of ‘87, but this one runs deep.

“I’ve never been one to build up a recruiting class,” Luginbill said, “because I’ve always thought the proof is in the pudding two years down the line. But I’m comfortable with this group.”

He should be.

Among SDSU’s recruits is Kearny’s Darnay Scott, a wide receiver who canceled visits to Ohio State and Arizona State and chose to stay home. He will have more impact here than Morse’s Teddy Lawrence will have at UCLA. Watch.

Another is Rancho Buena Vista’s Don Aliipule, The Times’ lineman of the year. Aliipule’s cousin Fred, another RBV behemoth, will keep it all in the family at SDSU.

Scott and the Aliipules, in fact, are among 11 San Diego County recruits who will stay home. This should be considered encouraging, because SDSU went through quite a few years getting beaten on the best in its own backyard.

However, this is far from a homegrown recruiting class.

SDSU will get Ray Peterson, a New Orleans wide receiver who was recruited by LSU and Oklahoma. The New Orleans Times-Picayune rated him one of the top 15 prospects in the state. Another Louisiana kid, linebacker Fred Harris from Shreveport, will head west after passing up Mississippi, Texas A&M;, LSU and Colorado.

Louisiana?

“We recruit hard in Louisiana, Arizona and Hawaii,” Luginbill said.

But Louisiana?

“Curtis Johnson, one of our assistant coaches, told me young men leave there,” Luginbill said.

Smart young men. Curtis Johnson was one of them. He was born in St. Rose, La. His resume does not indicate he has spent much time there since.

However, these young men will not find a Mardi Gras of a program at SDSU. None of them will. Luginbill recruits with the understanding that it is going to be tough. He insists on discipline both on the field and in the classroom (and every place else, for that matter).

The only interruption of our conversation Tuesday was a telephone call from a junior college transfer who apparently was asking about the mandatory 6 to 8 p.m., Monday through Thursday study hall.

Luginbill listened for a moment and then said: “I don’t make exceptions.”

No, there are no exceptions. To borrow a cliche, in this program, there is Al Luginbill’s way or the highway. These days, Luginbill’s way looks like the right way to go.