As 2027 signing class shapes up, Eastern Michigan coaches eye the 2028 cohort
The Eagles have remained steadfast in recruiting the high school ranks amidst the transfer portal era, and found success trying to work a year ahead.
Detroit — What Chris Creighton did on Monday at the Sound Mind Sound Body national collegiate showcase camp is, by his own measure, unusual.
Creighton extended a pair of offers, each going to a Canadian recruit in the trenches, as the Eagles seek to get a jump start on the 2028 recruiting cycle.
“So, on our staff, I'm the only one that gives out offers,” Creighton said on Monday at Wayne State. “So we've got coaches at multiple different camps right now. I'll probably be making some offers in the next couple days because we do — what I just did right there is really unusual.”
As the class of 2028 approaches the June 15 date after its collective sophomore year of high school, Creighton and Co. aren’t going to be left in the dust as they’ve used the camp circuit to get a head start on identifying the 2028 prospects they want to pursue. This, ideally, creates momentum into the following summer — where the class of 2027 finds itself now — as the Eagles begin the parade of official visits and, ideally, commitments. In just the last week, EMU has gotten at least four commitments to the 2027 signing class.
This forward looking approach, plus never losing the thread on the need for high school recruits amidst the shift to the transfer portal era, have helped define how Eastern Michigan goes about recruiting in the current paradigm of college football.
“The earlier it gets, there's a positive and then there's a cost,” Creighton said. “The earlier you start the relationship, the better you get to know guys throughout the whole process. But what's happened is almost all of our class has been committed prior to their senior season. So there are tons of guys that have phenomenal senior seasons. Late bloomers, just opportunity. But you can't sit and wait.”
While much has been made of how the transfer portal has changed college sports and football, more specifically, Creighton and Eastern Michigan have found that it hasn’t actually curtailed high school recruiting that much amidst the FBS.
“I think though the reality of it is that I said to our staff that, 'Hey, there's quality freshmen, high school kids that are not being recruited,'” Creighton said, recalling internal conversations. “Because people are just living in the transfer portal. But when we studied it, it has gone down some, but not as much as I thought.”
In general, the trend Creighton has seen is that teams generally need to replace in the ballpark of 40-50 players each year between graduations and, now, the transfer portal.
What it comes down to, then, is the question of ratios: How many high school signees, and how many transfers will make up the replacements for the outgoing players?
And how a program addresses that ratio is a multivariable calculation. Things like urgency to win, NIL and revenue share war chests, local recruiting territory and various year-to-year factors shape how any coach and program try to fill out their rosters.
Creighton sees the merit in both transfers and high school recruits, though he's not giving up on the latter as the lifeblood of a roster.
“It's fun to bring in transfers that know what they're doing, that are looking for an opportunity that you have and fit your culture,” Creighton said. “And you're not spending a year and a half recruiting them. There's part of it that's just like, 'Hey, let's go! This is awesome.'”
But that time spent on the recruiting trail, the year and a half Creighton will spend evaluating the 2028 class, just like he and his staff did with the 2027 class and 2026 before them, is invaluable, too.
At Eastern Michigan, that's also manifested in recruiting classes featuring if not a majority, at least a plurality of players coming from the high school ranks.
While things like the SMSB camps or various summer showcases are good spaces to see the athletic abilities and raw physical traits of prospects, plus get verified measurements, they’re no replacement for digging into the person and the culture fit.
Andrew Graham
Andrew Graham
Even in the more transactional world of college football, Creighton puts a big premium on that.
“Like we have so much homework and background to do on those guys,” Creighton said of the two Canadian prospects he extended offers to at Wayne State on Monday. “We know the programs that they're from and we knew their coaches, and their coaches were here with them. And they're 28s, so if they've robbed a bank we have plenty of time to figure it out.
“Because the person part actually really does matter to us.”
Transfers will play key roles for Eastern Michigan — starting quarterback Noah Kim is a transfer, for instance — and Creighton evidently isn’t shy about making the roster better with experienced players as the Eagles need and can get them.
But amidst the relatively new ability to patch up a roster with a raft of transfers, Creighton and the Eastern Michigan staff are finding plenty of value, still, in recruiting the high school ranks hard — and tactically trying to work a year ahead to turn over every stone and get every possible advantage.
“You love this,” Creighton said. “Giving a kid his first offer and seeing moms cry and explaining the process and watching them play their senior year and being on a chat with the other commits and watching those guys develop and all of that. And then to go through and become freshmen together, that's awesome. So we've got both.”
