Smith in his presser noted that if his guy and top Assistant, Shaw, wasn't named to succeed him, he'd want him at Stanford.

So I went to WSU's 247 site and learned that Shaw's top rival for the HC job was that younger up & coming Eastern Washington University coach Riley (he's the son of a Stanford Med Prof and a Gunn HS grad... then went to Div III Whitworth in Spokane for college (following strong family tradition) where he was their 3 pt sniper... and this Riley also the nephew of OSU/San Diego Chargers coach Mike Riley).
Tho apparently 4 others also being Zoom interviewed in prelim round. The Wash St Ass't AD has been put in charge of winnowing it down, but WSU President Schultz fully engaged and will do final interview.. Report on Wazzu's 247 site was that they hope to have Smith replacement announced by this weekend.

Shaw's Bio from Wazzu official site:
Randy Bennett & Calvin Sampson coaching DNA. Knows a thing or two.

Also, as an aside, Wash St boosters apparently raised $2.5 M to try keeping Smith on board.

Read and watch that here. This was before he was injured. Same day that I talked to Bob Gregory. Edwards should be back in time for fall camp per Troy Taylor.

Stanford Daily report. Still in early discussion. No consensus, plenty of uncertainty and questions: Also Stanford has an Internal NIL office whose Director, a Stanford employee, still to be filled.
Tried to cut & paste the URL link but my new iPad unable, still learning how to use it. Article a lead story in today’s Daily.

Add this award to Katie’s impressive list of accomplishments.

For those wanting a summary of the lawsuits the NCAA now faces, I am your huckleberry.

Mind you, I didn't say "quick summary." This is not because the cases can't be quickly summarized, but because there are so many of them. I follow this stuff fairly closely, but even I didn't know the roster of cases was THIS large.

2024 PG and Stanford signee Elijah Crawford has been bumped up to a 4-star by Rivals and is ranked 106th overall in his class.

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With Evan Stinson and Tallis Toure also signed, Stanford has the 45th best class in the 2024 Rivals team rankings. That’s a really good recruiting class for a new head coach to have coming in. Also a good sign for a kid to get a bump like that at the end of the recruiting cycle.

went 6 innings with Stanford ahead 7-1. But his relief gave up 5 to make it close. Trevor Moore brought in to close it out and secure the win at Sunken. Split the 2 game out of Conf series, Santa Clara won the earlier game at their place.

the weekend went very well and now Cole Tab is in

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Last week I spoke with an expert witness involved with the House case against the NCAA for past NIL violations. He said the NCAA could settle the case but doesn't seem inclined to do so. Then I read this last night:

This is a hold my beer moment for NIL in college sports.

Stanford really needs to have a "coming to Jesus" reckoning with itself and what it is going to do in major college sports. To me, it's insane to place roster restrictions nobody else has on teams forced to pay players for their services. Could there be anything dumber that embracing a system that forces you to pay lesser talent at the top of the market, to have a lousy product that loses money?

Stanford should divest football any maybe a few other sports from the university and allow it to have a different relationship with it than it has always had before. Athletes are allowed to play for Stanford as long as they meet certain requirements. Stanford can still accept those who are eligible for admission out of high school, but those that aren't get to be put into some "pre-Stanford" curriculum that allows them to maintain eligibility to play for the Stanford team. Then if they qualify, they get admitted to Stanford, but if they don't they have been paid for their services. Again, it's just sheer lunacy to be forced into a system where you are deciding to pay top dollar for lesser players who can get into Stanford, but will increase your odds of losing games and money, just to hold on to some self-imposed, holier than thou elitist practice that no longer applies to the market you compete in.

Used the Princeton offense at Columbia and USF's 1st 2 years, but with analytics then adapted to Euro-concepts:

Kiki Iriafen is in the transfer portal. Hopefully for Stanford, this will be another Maxime Raynaud situation where she comes back and gets the NIL she is looking for. One difference though is she's gonna have her degree, so that gives her more freedom. And then, I was also hearing smoke of this possibly happening, which lends more credibility to the rumors that she might be looking to play elsewhere. Especially since she has a "do not contact" tag. That often indicates they know where they want to go. Article to come.

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Alrighty, now is time for a new football recruiting notes thread for April. If you missed anything from March, the March thread is here.


First off, spring ball is now here! Stanford should have a good amount of recruits showing up for the Spring Showcase on Saturday, April 20th and also have kids stopping by during the weeks leading up to it. I'll do my best to keep people abreast of what's happening on that front.

Also, Stanford will be hosting recruits for official visits for the 2025 class in late May through June. As of now I have 13 guys on board for an official visit from May 30th through June 13th. I'm sure others will be added to the list over the course of the next couple of months. Of the 13 guys visiting so far, six are 4-star recruits, which is a pretty good percentage I would say. For the list of guys who I have marked as visiting, click here.

Also, remember to hit the "unofficial visits" tab to see the full list of visitors both official and unofficial. There are three 4-star guys (CB Chuck McDonald III, WR Daylan McCutcheon, and OT Andrew Babalola) that are taking unofficial visits in April while 4-star offensive tackle Ziyare Addison visited in mid-April on an unofficial visit. All of which could materialize into official visits. So, a lot happening on that front.

Stanford's incoming 2024 class is ranked 27th in Rivals team recruiting rankings with 25 commitments. Click here for that list just to refresh your memory. And then the 2025 class has three commitments (3-star OL Joshua Williams, 4-star QB Bear Bachmeier, and 3-star OL Siosiua Vete). In case you want to see any of their profiles, just click here. It's early yet, but as of now the 2025 class is ranked 42nd in the nation according to Rivals.

One freshman I should provide an update on is 4-star DE Benedict Umeh. I've been told from a good source that he's had a setback in his recovery and depending on how things go, he'll be out 5-6 months. So, I'm fully expecting him to redshirt this season.

Also, I know this isn't recruiting related, but wide receiver Elic Ayomanor underwent surgery for a sports hernia and went to the City of Brotherly Love to get it fixed. They found out he had the hernia on both sides and underwent the surgery to address both at the same time. He'll be out 6-8 weeks and will miss spring practice. However, he should be 100% going into training camp. Odds of his sports hernia issue resurfacing once he goes through the appropriate rehab and recovery is very low. So odds are good he'll be good to go going forward without it resurfacing.


Anyways, that's all I got for the recruiting notes thread for April. If anyone has any questions, just let me know. I'll also get a preview up for spring ball later today and re-drop the Umeh/Ayomanor info in that thread as well. Just figured I would address Umeh in this thread since he's an incoming recruit and then I figured, what the hell, might as well address Ayomanor, too. I was originally gonna drop that in the spring practice preview thread, but now I'll just do both. So now nobody will have an excuse not to know.

Read that here.

Courtesy of my man Morris Phillips. Figured you guys would enjoy reading it.

Anyone have thoughts on the 49ers first round selection. I have to say I'm very disappointed, feels like Dante Pettis remix. The WR right after their pick Leggette from South Carolina will be a star in the NFL IMHO. He looks like Deebo, Metcalf or AJ Brown and can fly. Hope I'm wrong about the Florida kid.

Awesome clutch performance by Canady.

Turned pro this year. 3rd place in this race. Running slow.

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Great comeback for the boys. Bats are coming along.

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Walter Rouse, 1st pick of the 6th round, vikings
Joshua Karty 33rd pick of the 6th round, rams

I just saw that Karty went to the Rams in the 6th round. One service gave this an A grade . Glad that he gets to stay in California.

Aaron Armitage has announced he is entering the portal. I heard something academic was the issue here but not 100% confirmed.

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Read and watch that here.

IMHO, Portland screwed up in letting him go
'the James C. Gaither Associate Head Men's Basketball Coach'.

I think this is a good move, especially given what’s happened the last few years.

Heisman returned

Read that here.

Read that here.