Everything seems to be going right for former NIU Defensive End Larry English.  He came in to the Senior Bowl practices with the right attitude and did everything he needed to do.  English played DE for most of the week, but flirted a little bit with OLB.

So, did his stock improve?

Tough to say.  I would say that had he not gone to the Senior Bowl that English would be a 2nd round pick for sure.  Now he is in that late 1st to really early 2nd round area.  Larry English had an all around solid week of practice with a decent game performance on Saturday.  No game-changing plays, but he made some things happen early on making a couple tackles, while repping the Huskie helmet with pride.  He really got his name out there and it just helps to meet with team execs as early and often as you can.  His stock is rising and can only go up come the NFL Combine February 18-24.

Trust me: Larry English will own the combine.

I remember seeing in an old Phil Steele magazine some combine numbers that English had that were off the charts.  I can't find the exact numbers, but Larry can shatter the earth come 3 weeks from now.  He can vault himself to a sure 1st round pick for a lucky team with a solid performance.

#51 really isn't hibernating.  I suspect he's in some warm weather state right now working his ass off to make that cash in the draft.

February 4th - National Signing Day

Unlike most of Novak's regime, Coach Jerry Kill is going after some of the big boys on the national scene, but it seems to me like there have been less hits than misses lately.  Here are a few of the players that we (allegedly) offered who have recently committed to other schools:

Florida DE Marques Aiken (Marshall)

Florida CB Rishard Anderson (Syracuse)

Louisiana RB Kenny Cain (TCU)

Louisiana CB Shakiel Smith (Tulane)

Missouri OT Parker Graham (Oklahoma State)

Damn you former MAC team Marshall and former NIU DC Scott Shafer of Syracuse!

On the bright side, we're already in the upper echelon of team recruiting rankings in the MAC per Rivals.com.  I think it's a little crazy how we're already above Central Michigan's 28-man class that contains 6 3-star prospects.

I expect our class to be around CMU's number of 28 players.  Maybe more.  There are a lot of unreported verbals already and we will find those out on signing day along with the kids that will sign at the last minute possible.  Kill has been super secretive about a lot of things, so I'm going to assume recruiting falls in that boat as well.

We're still in pursuit of a few top players such as standout Florida RB Branden Oliver, who we could extend one of our last remaining scholarships to.