You are saying it will be a big difference between a school that pays and does not. Say Houston and Indiana. Assuming Indiana's is low $2000 (I'm too lazy to look it up, but Big 10 seems to be low across the board) you are saying a kid would choose there over SMU who hypothetically is paying nothing. So that $2000 would be big. Yet you are saying that a kid deciding between USC and BYU in which the difference is $3000 will mean absolutely nothing. That makes no sense whatsoever.

Now are we all of the sudden going to start getting bigger and better recruits than USC? Of course not. But for a kid that is on the fence more money will absolutely make a difference. How big of a difference depends completely on the kid.