The month ahead will be a busy one for University of Tennessee at Chattanooga football coach Russ Huesman. Not only is he in the final four weeks of recruiting -- signing day is a month from today -- but his entire family is finally relocating here from Richmond, Va.
In addition, Huesman has a pair of vacancies on his staff to fill after defensive line coach Fred Tate took a job at Marshall and recruiting coordinator/defensive backs coach Carter Cardwell stepped down for personal reasons.
A month before signing day might seem to be a bad time to lose a recruiting coordinator, Huesman said Thursday, but he doesn't expect it to be too debilitating.
"This time of year, (for a) recruiting coordinator there's really not much to do," he said. "We're just all recruiting. ... It's not critical. Obviously getting Fred's and Carter's areas handled is the most important thing, and making sure that anybody that they were recruiting, we follow up with, we get them assigned to coaches -- that's the most important thing right now.
"That title is mostly in the offseason when you're getting mailings done and you're doing the organization for the year. We're on track right now, so we're OK with all that."
The Mocs already have seven commitments for the upcoming signing class. In addition, they've added transfers Chris Donald from the University of Tennessee and Nick Davison from UAB. Also coming back to UTC is wideout Brian Sutherland, who left the team early in the season for personal reasons.
Donald is expected to play either linebacker or defensive end, and Davison is an interior defensive lineman. The Mocs lost 12 seniors from their two-deep roster on offense and defense, plus second-team All-American kicker Craig Camay, so there are some key holes to fill.
The defense lost starting defensive end Josh Beard, the Southern Conference player of the year, starting defensive tackle B.J. Taylor and starting linebackers Joseph Thornton and Steven Smigelsky. Huesman said his "biggest priority" was going to be signing defensive players.
"That's huge, and we need them all the way across the board," he said, but primarily on the defensive line and at linebacker since UTC returns all four starters in the secondary. "We have to have a great year at those positions. Not only for next year, but to build this thing where we need to have it built."
Huesman said he expects to have from 17-19 scholarships available. He said next weekend will be the Mocs' first big one for on-campus visits.
A year ago, Huesman was just settling into the job and was having to hustle to hire a staff and put together a recruiting class in about five weeks. This time around, recruiting is much more organized, plus the Mocs are coming off a 6-5 season, their first since 2005, after which Huesman was named the SoCon coach of the year.
"It's different, it's way different," he said of recruiting this winter compared to last year.
The Mocs' success in 2009 gives Huesman and his staff a lot more tangible selling points than they had a year ago, when the pitch was primarily about the potential of the program.
The one big question mark surrounding the program is whether or not UTC will be eligible to participate in the 2010 playoffs. The Mocs were banned the NCAA from the 2009 FCS playoffs because of poor historical Academic Progress Rate scores, and they haven't yet heard if their new numbers are good enough to have the ban lifted.
In addition to the playoff ban, UTC was also hit with scholarship reductions and practice-time cuts. The scholarship reductions -- UTC could only have 56.6, compared to the FCS limit of 63 -- have the most dramatic impact on recruiting. However, Huesman has said often that it's imperative that the Mocs solve their APR problems as soon as possible, both for the current players to have a chance to compete for championships and for the future of the program.