Somehow we found room for Devin Kaufusi, who had 0 other offers. His highlights are not in the same ballpark as Gustin's. Gustin is bigger, faster, stronger, a better tackler, and seems to play with better instincts. Chances are that they will end up playing the same position in college unless coaches are thinking that the kid who is 6'5" 200 lbs is a better DE prospect than the stronger, faster kid who is 6'5" 240 lbs.

As I see it, there's no way around the fact that the coaching staff messed up on this one. When the whole country starts offering an LDS kid in your backyard, you whiffed. Sure, guys like Martzen can do their damage control and say there were no schollies, but we just missed. He's gone for good at this point because Bronco would never give in to a kid whose parents go to the media saying he messed up.

Do I think it's a big deal that we missed on Gustin? Yes and no. No in the sense that I think we'll still have great defenses for years to come without him. Yes in the fact that the coaching staff has consistently made this type of mistake in the past (offering kids with no other offers, and neglecting great LDS talent with other offers who wanted to come here). I think we're improving in this area, but apparently we haven't learned all the lessons there are to be learned. I was saying 3-4 years ago that we were missing with many of our recruits, especially on the OL, and that it would cause problems down the road. That is what happened. Now our recruiting is improving, but maybe there is still a lesson or two to be learned.

The bottom line is that in order to be a top 10 team BYU needs to get >75% of the top LDS kids in the country. Gustin is one of those kids, and while we may be able to absorb his loss, we can't continue to absorb many more similar losses.