As Willie Taggart sat in front of multiple members of the media on Wednesday afternoon, he couldn’t help but smile. Taggart, Oregon’s new head coach, was addressing the media after putting together his first recruiting class for the Ducks.
“There are a lot of messages out there but more it’s about getting the swagger back at Oregon — getting it back to where it belongs,” Taggart said. “Everyone realized that not too long ago Oregon was playing in a national championship game. Everyone wanted to know what the possibilities are (of returning to the national championship) and it’s going to take a lot of work — take a commitment by everyone in the program to get back there.”
In order to make a splash on the 2017 recruiting trail, Taggart said he and his staff went with the honesty approach to make up for the limitations they faced.
Unlike many programs around the nation, Taggart and his staff were left with just under three months to put together a recruiting class that is expected to help Oregon return to national prominence. They also dealt with facing the fallout from two negative incidents involving the coaching staff in the past month.
“It (the national incidents) came up and we told them the truth — we got nothing to hide,” Taggart said. “The weight room issue, we felt that was bogus. It was told the wrong way and we explained to them exactly what happened. If you got the true story you understood but it’s sad it was reported the way it was.”
With national signing day coming to a close, Oregon has secured signed national letters of intent from 24 players, including a major win in Deommodore Lenoir, Rivals’ N0. 1-ranked athlete. Taggart has likely landed a top-25 class nationally.
Taggart made a point during the press conference that there was a need at every position. He and his staff went into the recruiting cycle looking to add players who would challenge the current players on the roster for playing time.
“For us, watching our football team, we felt like there was a need at every position,” Taggart said. “Like I told our football team, ‘we are going to go and recruit guys to come take your jobs,’ and it was going to be on (them) to keep their jobs.”
Another big win along the recruiting trail was the addition of offensive lineman Cody Shear, a local product from Sheldon High School in Eugene. Shear, a 3-star prospect, was committed to Arizona for a long time before receiving a full-ride offer from Taggart early this morning.
“I got a text from coach (Mario) Cristobal really early this morning. I talked to him the first time at 5:30,” Shear told the Oregonian “Basically, he said, ‘I’m in a meeting right now. I need to know what time you are signing.’ I told him I was supposed to sign with Arizona at 7 o’clock.
“I got a text that told me to call coach Willie Taggart before I signed, and he told me, ‘You’ve grown up down the street from Autzen. Who do you want to play for?’ I told him Oregon and they offered me a full ride.”
With the addition of Shear, Oregon has now signed two Eugene products over the previous two years, a theme he hopes to keep growing as time goes on.
“We are going to do our best to try and take care of Oregon first and not lose any kids in-state to anyone outside of here,” Taggart said. “We want to take care of Oregon — we are going to recruit the northwest.”
On the day, the Ducks signed 24 players from six different states. Ten players hail from the state of California, with seven from Florida and two from Oregon.
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