Indiana dominated with portal power, but Texas A&M's balanced blueprint offers a sustainable path to victory. Discover the winning strategy.
Indiana's win in the National Championship on Monday will change how college coaches build teams forever.
In the past, teams were built through strong recruiting classes and solid development, turning potential into real-life production. If a team had a coaching staff that could nurture young players while coaching the veterans on the field, it was the sign of an elite program.
But as the Hoosiers showed us this season, teams don't need to wait for talent to blossom to succeed anymore. Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti built his roster through the Transfer Portal, opting for older, more experienced players.
That approach brought him and his team to the promised land.
After the Hoosiers triumph, it would seem logical for other top college football programs, like Texas A&M, to follow in Cignetti's footsteps.
But the truth is, Indiana's formula for success will be hard to replicate for any program, even one with resources like the Aggies.
Roster turnover is difficult to navigate. On paper, bringing in tons of players with experience at the collegiate level sounds great, but in reality, most coaching staffs would struggle with adapting to an almost completely new set of players every season.
Yes, recruiting has lost a lot of its luster with the rise of the Transfer Portal, but getting the signatures of the top high school players in the country remains crucial to roster building.
The teams that can balance the two will likely rise to the top. That's exactly what Texas A&M head coach Mike Elko is trying to do in College Station.
The Aggies have been solid on both fronts this cycle, bringing in the ninth-ranked high school recruiting class and 11th-ranked transfer class so far, according to 247 Sports. They slot in at eighth in overall player acquisition(HS recruits and transfers combined).
And Elko and his staff are already making big moves for A&M's 2027 HS recruiting class.
The Aggies have commitments from 10 class of 2027 players thus far, all composite four-star rated or above. It's extremely early, but recruiting is all about momentum, and A&M has a lot of it at the moment.
None of these players are proven, but the hope is that some of them can develop into key players in the squad, like QB Marcel Reed and LB Taurean York from the Aggies' 2023 class.
It's important to take advantage of the portal and snatch top-end talent from rivals like A&M did with former Alabama WR Isaiah Horton, but the high school level is also full of future college and NFL superstars.
It's tough, but it's the landscape coaches are dealing with at the moment. So far, Elko is handling it pretty well.