Rutgers Football: 3 newcomers who’ll have instant impacts in 2020

Which newcomers to the Rutgers football program will have the greatest impact this season as the Scarlett Knights look to rebuild?

From 2005-11, Rutgers had the closest thing to a heyday they’d ever had in their football program’s history. The Scarlet Knights did not have much history before Greg Schiano arrived in Piscataway.

In the decade before Schiano was hired as head coach in 2001, Rutgers had not been to a bowl game and had no winning seasons. During Schiano’s tenure, the Scarlet Knights went to six bowl games — winning five — and won 11 games in 2006.

There has been little hope at the state university of New Jersey since Schiano left almost a decade ago. Since he left, there were three good seasons under Kyle Flood and then the NCAA hit Rutgers with sanctions during an era where Rutgers athletics were a mess.

What’s ironic about the Scarlet Knights is despite what they look like currently, it has not been that long since they’ve been a winning program. However, they’ve sunk as low as a program could since 2015.

Chris Ash was hired from Ohio State in 2016 and they were as bad a program as there was in the Power Five during his tenure. They had two double-digit losing seasons under Ash and he was fired early last season.

They look to an overhaul in their staff and some new faces to turn their fortunes around. It’s not going to be easy in the stacked Big Ten East, but their hope is some new — and not so new — blood will turn things around in Jersey.

Here are three newcomers they hope will have an impact this season.