Signing Day 2013 is over (for highlights, click here) -- at least enough for Rivals.com to go ahead and declare Alabama the champion of this year’s recruiting battle. Yes, rankings are subjective, but would you have expected anything less from the three-time BCS champion of the past four years?
Likewise, it makes sense that the conference housing the last seven national champions has 11 of the top 25 recruiting classes this year. In fact, five SEC West programs pulled in a top-10 recruiting class. Ole Miss, coming off a 7-6 season under first-year coach Hugh Freeze, had arguably the biggest day with the No. 7 class in the country. Florida, at No. 4, is the only SEC East program to climb into Rivals’ top-10.
Of the five other BCS conferences, the Pac-12 has four top-25 classes, and the ACC, Big Ten and Big 12 all have three. Notre Dame ends the day with the No. 3 class in the country.
In the Big Ten, the arrival of Urban Meyer at Ohio State has the makings of a two-horse race between the Buckeyes and arch rival Michigan for years to come. No other Big Ten program came close to matching what the two rival programs did during this year’s recruiting tour.
USC had one of the smallest classes this year thanks to NCAA-mandated scholarship reductions, but for the second year in a row, no other program did more with less. The Trojans landed four five-star commits and seven four-star commits. Still, Lane Kiffin was beat out in the recruiting rankings by cross-town rival UCLA. The Bruins finished the day with its class just outside the top 1o one season under Jim Mora
If you love good rivalries, recruiting classes from Michigan and Ohio State, as well as UCLA and USC, indicate there will be some fun games ahead for years to come.
Rivals has a complete breakdown of how each BCS program did this Signing Day. Below are the individual rankings:
(All rankings in this post reflect Rivals.com; 247Sports, Scout.com rankings in parenthesis)
1. Alabama (No. 1, 247Sports; No. 3, Scout.com)
2. Ohio State (No. 2, 247Sports; No. 1 Scout.com)
3. Notre Dame (No. 3, 247Sports; No. 4, Scout.com)
4. Florida (No. 4, 247Sports; No. 8, Scout.com)
5. Michigan (No. 5, 247Sports; No. 2, Scout.com)
6. LSU (No. 7, 247Sports; t-No. 6, Scout.com)
7. Ole Miss (No. 6, 247Sports; No. 9, Scout.com)
8. Auburn (No. 11, 247Sports; No. 13, Scout.com)
9. Florida State (No. 8, 247Sports; No. 16, Scout.com)
10. Texas A&M (No. 10, 247Sports; t-No. 6, Scout.com)
11. UCLA (No. 9, 247Sports; No. 5, Scout.com)
12. Georgia (No. 12, 247Sports; No. 10, Scout.com)
13. USC (No. 14, 247Sports; No. 18, Scout.com)
14. Clemson (No. 13, 247Sports; No. 12, Scout.com)
15. Oklahoma (No. 15, 247Sports; No. 15, Scout.com)
16. South Carolina (No. 21, 247Sports: No. 21, Scout.com)
17. Nebraska (No. 23, 247Sports: No. 11, Scout.com)
18. Washington (No. 18, 247Sports; No. 14, Scout.com)
19. Vanderbilt (No. 30, 247Sports; No. 19, Scout.com)
20. Tennessee (No. 25, 247Sports; No. 32, Scout.com)
21. Oregon (No. 19, 247Sports; No. 17, Scout.com)
22. Virginia (No. 29, 247Sports; No. 41, Scout.com)
23. Texas (No. 16, 247Sports; No. 23 Scout.com)
24. West Virginia (No. 35, 247Sports; No. 26, Scout.com)
25. Mississippi State (No. 24, 247Sports; No. 20, Scout.com)