I have been the guy keeping Wiki up-to-date with FB and BB recruiting over the last few years. Definitions of the four categories I use:
Players of Interest: This list starts with many of the better players from ND and NW MN. It does not necessarily mean that UND is seriously considering or even talking to them. As we learn, from a variety of sources, that UND is looking at a specific player (whether from Lakota or Phoenix), they are added to the list. I don't remove any players from this list as time goes on - unless the player moves to another list. I do note when someone has verballed to another school but when it gets closer to signing day, much less attention is given to these 100+ players. I am sure I am missing some of their verbals.
Offers: Quite self-explanatory. A player is added to this list when we are quite sure he has been offered via a reliable source. (See comment regarding sources below). The Mussman regime's philosophy was to make many offers very early. I won't get into whether I think that was a good philosophy or not but I assume offers will not go out in bulk as they have in the past. Whether there is a coaching change or not, offers are often withdrawn for a variety of reasons. Unfortunately, it is difficult to learn when that happens. Every year, there are undoubtedly still players on that list whose offer have been withdrawn.
Offered but Verballed Elsewhere: Also self-explanatory. I try to keep this as up-to-date as possible. It is interesting to see where guys we wanted end up - FCS, bowl division, accept PWO offers, etc. As noted above, there may be players on this list whose offer had been withdrawn by UND.
Verballed Commitments: These are obviously verbals to UND. I try to make sure they are fact before adding them. PWOs and Greyshirts are broken out. I leave the info about other offers there as this is also interesting to see how heavily recruited a player is, etc.
Sources: Pretty good info is provided through the national recruiting websites: Rivals, ESPN, Scout, etc. SFI, of course, is specific to UND FB and they do a great job. There are other state specific websites (WSN - WI, Edgy Tim - IL, etc) are also great sources. A great deal of the info comes from other SS.com members - Hambone, especially. Hambone (like myself) works on this year-around while others gets quite involved as signing date approaches. I have yet to get into social media but I know it is a good source and others pay a lot of attention to it.
While the Wiki recruiting lists are for all UND fans and anyone can make additions/revisions, I think it is best that only one person update it. A couple of years ago, 3-4 people were, with good intentions, trying to update the lists as new info was learned. Quite frankly, it got screwed up. I certainly don't have any ownership over this and if someone else would like to take this on, it would be fine. I would just hope that it would be someone who takes this seriously and works on it (BB, too) year around.
