This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
In terms of pure volume, Utah will never pump out the number of Division I football players that pipeline states like California, Texas and Florida do.
But in terms of percentages? Turns out Utah stacks up pretty well.
According to nationalhsfootball.com, which analyzed where every Division I recruit who signed on National Signing Day was from, Utah's ratio of D-I signees to overall high school players is eighth in the country. That puts Utah ahead of the likes of Texas, California and several southern states.
The analysis shows one out of every 366 high school player in Utah signed a D-I letter of intent last Wednesday. In total, Utah had such 24 players. In comparison, only one in 510 players in Texas signed, despite the Lone Star State producing 324 signees, the most in the country.
There were several other interesting tidbits in the analysis, too. For instance, five states didn't have a single player sign with a D-I program. Perhaps unsurprisingly, those states were: Vermont, Rhode Island, North Dakota, South Dakota and Maine. Four other states — Alaska, New Hampshire, Montana and West Virginia — had just one player sign.
Also, players in Florida were the most likely to have their college dreams fulfilled. The Sunshine State had 316 recruits sign — second only to Texas — meaning a staggering one out of every 110 players in the state were headed to a D-I program.
— Bubba Brown