Texas Football: 3 most painful Charlie Strong recruiting misses

Who were the biggest misses for former head coach Charlie Strong and tries at the 2014-2016 Texas football recruiting classes?

Finding success on the recruiting trail usually isn’t a problem for the Texas football program, especially under the last three coaching regimes. Even the worst of years in terms of actual success on the gridiron under the direction of the last three head coaches saw class rankings hold steady on the recruiting trail. The weird narrative involving a discrepancy between success in the win column and on the recruiting trail was never a hotter topic than the three years under former head coach Charlie Strong.

During his three years with Texas, Strong posted a record of 16-21. He was also 0-1 in bowl games, as Texas would fall short at the hands of head coach Bret Bielema and the Arkansas Razorbacks to cap the 2014 campaign. Strong never finished any of his three seasons on the Forty Acres with a winning record. And he was only postseason eligible on one occasion.

The final year for Strong with the Texas program saw him cap things off in a terrible way, with a road loss against the lowly Kansas Jayhawks in 2016.

Texas rounded out with the following slots in the national class rankings during Strong’s tenure with the program: 2016 (7th nationally, 1st Big 12), 2015 (10th nationally, 1st Big 12), and 2014 (17th nationally, 2nd Big 12). The recruiting class rankings definitely weren’t the biggest problem for Strong.

It was largely the anemic offensive production that Texas had for those three seasons under Strong’s direction that was his biggest problem. But recruiting misses can always be a storyline when looking back on a coaching tenure like that of Strong.

Here’s a look into the three most painful recruiting misses for former head coach of the Texas Longhorns football program Strong during his three year tenure on the Forty Acres.