Nebraska Football: 5 reasons Mike Riley is squarely on the hot seat

4. Missing big in-state recruits, keeping big names at Nebraska

Recruiting hasn’t necessarily been one of Riley’s main issues since arriving in Lincoln. His staff has actually done a pretty solid job with drawing in the bigger names and recruits across the country since his arrival.

One of the biggest recruits and names in Nebraska has been Keyshawn Johnson and his teammates that joined him from Calabasas. Keyshawn almost preformed as recruiter as he drew in interest from many other players in his area. Now that he isn’t a part of the program and with the Huskers recent struggles, there is a worry that recruits will begin to back out.

With that being said, it is hard to harp on a program who has recruited so well these past couple seasons. One of the biggest questions though is why Nebraska continues to overlook the talent here at home.

Several big name recruits right out of the metro area have been overlooked by the Huskers and have went their separate. Former gatorade player of the year C.J. Johnson, out of Bellevue, Nebraska was overlooked by the Huskers even though his dad was a former Husker football player himself. Now C.J. is one of the starting wideouts for the Wyoming Cowboys and has already made a positive impact for that offense.

Yes that is just one name, but there are several others. Noah Fant, tight end out of Omaha, Nebraska was the former No. 1 recruit in the state of Nebraska in 2016 and he committed to the Iowa Hawkeyes, the Huskers main rival. Jared Bubak, Adam Holtorf and Harrison Phillips are other big name recruits that signed away from home because of the lack of interest they received from Nebraska.

Maybe, just maybe, Nebraska will begin to take a deeper look into hometown players this upcoming recruiting season.