‘There was nobody here’: An inside look at how a first-time head coach built a recruiting staff from scratch

DALLAS — When Rhett Lashlee took over as SMU’s head coach on Nov. 29, he had plenty of Day 1 to-dos: meet with the current team, start hiring assistant coaches and settle into his new office.

Around 6 p.m. that day, he turned to recruiting. His first step involved calling each 2022 recruit who was committed to SMU at that time. One small problem, though.

“There was nobody here,” Lashlee said, referring to the coaching and recruiting staff. “There’s nobody to ask, ‘Can someone get me a list of commits?’ So I just said ‘OK, I’ll just Google it.’”

When former SMU coach Sonny Dykes left for the job at rival TCU, he took much of the on-field and recruiting staff with him. And though SMU football offices were a ghost town when Lashlee grabbed his cell phone, it was a slight embellishment: A few folks stayed with the team briefly to bridge the gap as did some assistants who weren’t joining Dykes at TCU.

But for the most part, everyone else left. Lashlee had to rebuild SMU’s personnel department virtually from scratch. When he was a graduate assistant at Auburn in 2009, he could count on one hand how many folks were solely dedicated to recruiting. In 2022, recruiting staffs at some schools have grown into sprawling, multi-faceted units that leave no stones unturned.

For diehard college football fans who closely follow recruiting, this arms race is familiar. But for the casuals who just check in on national signing day or when their school lands a big-time recruit, the growing size and scale of these staffs may be surprising.

Lashlee and the SMU staff gave The Athletic an inside look at how he constructed the Ponies personnel department, the intricacies of the different roles and everything that goes into succeeding in modern-day recruiting.

Recruiting coordinator: Kyle Cooper

The title “recruiting coordinator” — an on-field, full-time assistant coach who oversees recruiting — has existed for decades. Power conference programs assigned the title to staffers as far back as the 1970s, and the role may have existed even earlier. A 1963 Ohio State team guide referenced an assistant coach as being “in charge of the recruiting program.”

But recruiting has changed drastically since that time and so have the duties. A decade ago, a recruiting coordinator, a personnel director and a high school relations director sufficed at most programs. As coaches shifted from primarily recruiting high school seniors to offering scholarships to juniors, sophomores and even freshmen, the workload increased. Earlier recruiting means more unofficial visit opportunities for prospects. Add in the year-round nature of the transfer portal, which adds another layer to player acquisition, and it’s much more than one person can handle.

At SMU, nickelbacks coach Kyle Cooper is also the Mustangs recruiting coordinator. The way he sees it, the recruiting support staff he oversees does 90 percent of the work while Cooper serves as the liaison to Lashlee and the position coaches to keep communication clear.

“I want to make sure the coaches know who to go to,” Cooper said. “I don’t want there to be too much cross tangling where things can be missed because there’s too many cooks in the kitchen.”

Rather than have five different position coaches approach the team’s graphic designer with separate requests for custom recruiting graphics, they funnel those to Cooper, who can then communicate it to the appropriate people. Or if there’s an issue with a recruit that needs addressing, Cooper — who meets once a week with the recruiting braintrust — is the point person.

Cooper, who worked with Lashlee at UConn, SMU and Miami before returning to the Hilltop, also has a key role in evaluation. He has a good sense for the team’s talent and needs at various positions because he’s on the field every practice and reviewing film afterward. Naturally, he knows the defense better than the offense, but he communicates with offensive coordinator Casey Woods to get a better sense for that group.

The recruiting staff knows and understands those needs, from pure ability to prototypical measurables SMU seeks at each position, so there’s synergy between the groups. When the personnel directors identify players, they’ll highlight the ones the staff should dive deeper into.

“We have a feel for what type of safety we need, or if we need more length at corner,” Cooper said.

On a typical practice day, Cooper ensures visiting recruits meet with their respective position coaches. He’s on a group text with the recruiting staff, which has the prospects’ customized visit itineraries.

Once practice begins, Cooper will sneak away during some pre-practice walkthrough or other periods in which he doesn’t have to be hands-on with his current players to ensure that everything is running smoothly and that prospects have an opportunity to meet Lashlee. But once the whistle blows, he’s focused on coaching his current team and the rest falls on the recruiting staff.

“When I’m on the field, they’ve got a handle on it and they’re good people,” Cooper said.

Director of recruiting operations: Bobby Brown

After hiring Cooper as his on-field recruiting coordinator, Lashlee sought a director of player personnel. Within the industry it’s often referred to by its acronym, DPP, and usually oversees the off-field recruiting staff. From organization to scouting to roster management, the DPP is the heart of a modern-day recruiting department.

Lashlee interviewed two “highly recommended” people for the job: Air Force coordinator of recruiting and player personnel Bobby Brown and Rice director of recruiting Alex Brown. He loved Bobby’s organizational and operational skills as well as Alex’s scouting acumen and knowledge of the transfer portal.

“They both really impressed me,” Lashlee said. “I thought, ‘I really need both of them.’”

So he hired both, essentially splitting the DPP role into two to play to their strengths. Bobby Brown is SMU’s director of recruiting operations while Alex Brown is the director of scouting.

The duties under Bobby Brown’s purview are lengthy. He updates SMU’s recruiting board with relevant information on the staff’s targets, whether it’s news about a player’s recruitment or data they received from a camp or combine. He works with the defensive coaches to sift through potential prospects that the recruiting staff has highlighted (Alex Brown works with the offensive staff).

Bobby touches base with SMU’s on-campus recruiting director to ensure details for the week’s official and/or unofficial visitors are mapped out. He checks with the creative department to stay on top of graphic design needs. He’s also the liaison to academics and compliance, working through those necessary details on incoming players. Currently, he’s also onboarding SMU’s 2022 recruiting class, making sure their admissions process is running smoothly. He communicates with Cooper on anything that needs the coaching staff’s attention.

With full-timers, interns and student workers included, SMU’s recruiting department consists of more than 20 people.

In his first month on the job, before other positions were hired, it was almost a round-the-clock gig.

“I don’t know how many hours I slept, but it wasn’t much,” he joked. “Sometimes I was here until 3 a.m., and then waking up at 5:30.”

And, until SMU hires a high school relations director — which Lashlee said they will “at the right time” — Brown assumes some of those duties, too. That includes organizing SMU’s summer camps, notably the second annual Dallas Showcase, a Texas-sized mega camp that drew more than 4,000 prospects and 400 coaches last year (this year’s edition already has coaches from 64 colleges committed). Bobby also reaches out to area high school coaches to keep them abreast of SMU’s spring practice schedule (like most Texas programs, the Ponies have an open door for high school coaches to visit) and provides feedback to those coaches when they send Hudl links to the staff for evaluation.

His workload has become more manageable as the staff has filled out, but around the country, he sees some of his counterparts lacking the support he has.

“A lot of teams are kind of behind on how many positions are needed (in recruiting),” Brown said. “There’s so many levels to a recruitment. Every one of those levels is just as important as the one next to it.”

Scouting director/transfer portal expert: Alex Brown

While Alex Brown’s official title is director of scouting, it doesn’t accurately describe what occupies the bulk of his time: mining the transfer portal.

Brown’s roots are in player personnel, and when Lashlee hired him away from Rice — where he spent three seasons as the recruiting director — it gave Brown the chance to execute his vision for evaluation.

“We can make this a pro evaluating process,” Brown said. “High school recruiting is the draft, free agency is the transfer portal.”

His position is the perfect example of one that didn’t exist even five years ago. The transfer portal launched in 2018 and the one-time transfer rule followed in 2021. Every program utilizes the portal to some degree, and it has paid off for SMU. Under Dykes, the Mustangs found all-conference players and key contributors via the portal and will continue that strategy under Lashlee.

Brown emphasizes preparation and lives in Google Sheets. With the help of student workers, he built a spreadsheet that includes every active FBS player in Texas. It includes all of the player’s basic information (position, jersey number, height, weight, classification, hometown, high school) plus columns for verified combine or track times, medical history, evaluation notes and a tag for whether the player is from the Dallas-Fort Worth area. The last part is important because SMU’s transfer strategy is rooted in “bouncebacks,” high-end prospects who initially sign with Power 5 programs elsewhere but decide, for whatever reason, that they want to return home.

Instead of evaluating a player after hitting the portal, this database — if done right — gives SMU a head start. For example, on one active defensive lineman at another Texas school in Brown’s database, he notes that the player had limited snaps last season, but “ideal size/frame/strength and play speed for what we need. Monitor through spring. Take if he portals. -AB.”

Like the rest of SMU’s recruiting department, Brown has interns and student workers from the school’s sports management program to help out. He has two monitoring the portal in shifts from 5 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily so that they know whenever a new player hits. He uses other tools, like a portal tracker from SportsSource Analytics that updates every four hours and offers more detailed player information, like how many games, starts or snaps a player has and at what level. He sends Cooper a daily portal update with highlighted names for the coaching staff to evaluate.

If a player hits the portal who SMU coaches haven’t scouted, it’s not hard to pull film. SMU uses Pro Football Focus’ PFF Ultimate to do it.

“We have the ability to pull a cutup of anybody who has played college snaps and see their key plays,” Cooper said.

But if a backup lineman played, say, 85 snaps, Brown can whittle it down to perhaps a couple dozen plays of note that show the good, bad and ugly and give coaches a clearer picture of that player’s ability.

Brown keeps a portal “board” for each position that includes those who are currently in the portal and those who aren’t but that the staff wants to monitor.

In addition to portal duties, Brown is also heavily involved in evaluating high school prospects, focusing on the traits and characteristics that SMU seeks, funneling those to the staff in much the way he does the portal prospects (again, Alex works with the offense in this area, Bobby Brown with the defense). The other critical part of his job is self scouting: knowing what SMU has on its current roster and what it needs.

Gone are the days of inking 25 high school prospects on signing day like clockwork. The number of players a team can take varies based on how many players it signs via the portal and how many of its own players transfer. So Brown is attending practices, making his own evaluation notes to better understand how the coaches teach, what they seek and where the Ponies may need reinforcements.

“Evaluating your own team and knowing how they stack up to your conference is the most important thing,” Brown said.

Director of on-campus recruiting: Shay Taylor

Although Shay Taylor has Louisiana roots, she’s SMU through and through.

The St. Rose, La., native was a three-sport star at Destrehan High School, but when she signed up to be a football trainer for the varsity team, it put her on a path she never really envisioned. Her older brother, Tyree, was a former SMU linebacker and team captain of the 1999 squad, and she decided to attend the school, too, serving as a student trainer under former SMU coaches Phil Bennett and June Jones. After graduating, Jones hired her as an administrative assistant in recruiting, where she spent six years. Mostly, it was a way to help pay tuition as she earned her second SMU degree, a master’s in counseling.

Upon earning her master’s, she left the sports world but missed it. After two years and a few missed opportunities, she found her way back in at Arizona State. In February, Lashlee brought her back to the Hilltop as the director of on-campus recruiting.

“You look up and you’re living your dream,” Taylor said.

In her role, being an alumnus isn’t required but it’s a plus. She knows who to contact at the business school, where the library is and the quickest route to the campus Starbucks. Hosting players is easier when you know how to get around.

When recruits visit campus, it’s Taylor’s job to iron out the details. Building out itineraries for prospects and their families. Working with vendors to get food in. If it’s an official visit, setting up transportation and hotels. Communicating with the compliance department constantly to ensure the school follows NCAA rules.

It’s not just big-picture stuff, either. Taylor makes sure to walk every single step she plans to take visitors on before they arrive.

“Do we have enough water?” she said. “Are the floors clean? Do I need to pick up trash? Are the toilets clean?”

Little things can turn into a big deal. On visits, every recruit gets a lanyard with a custom name tag on it. Names must be spelled correctly, or it could leave a bad impression.

Taylor must be prepared but flexible. In a fertile recruiting area like Dallas, a four-star recruit may decide on a whim that he wants to visit. If that happens, it’s time to drop everything and go.

Not all visits are the same. If it’s an out-of-state prospect who can’t easily travel to SMU, he might get the full campus tour, photo shoot, everything, because it’s unclear how often he can return.  If he’s a 15-minute drive away and just wants to stop by to watch practice, the “first time out is a Coke and a smile,” Taylor said.

Working with the rest of the recruiting staff, Taylor strategizes each recruit’s itinerary. If it’s a prospect who will likely be on campus multiple times, visits are constructed to build anticipation. Taylor wants to avoid showing prospects the same spots repeatedly while tailoring things to each recruit’s interests and creating excitement for the next visit.

And it’s not just about hosting the prospects. It’s ensuring their family members, or whoever accompanies them — it could be friends, coaches or trainers — is comfortable and enjoying the experience. If mom’s tired and her feet hurt, Taylor is quick to adjust so that the visit doesn’t feel like a drag (as well as ensuring that a golf cart is gassed up and ready to go nearby).

“I’m less of a structure person,” Taylor said. “Let’s have everything ready, but let’s ebb and flow this thing.”

The job gets hectic based on the sheer number of visitors. Official visits used to be only in the fall and winter but now occur in the spring, too. Transfer targets are also a huge deal (SMU hosted Alabama transfer running back Camar Wheaton and Georgia tackle transfer Owen Condon last weekend). Most schools host multiple junior days during a recruiting cycle, and they can range from small (10-15 prospects) to large (upward of 50). That all requires Taylor’s planning. Some things are always prepared: “(Recruits’) names are always on the ticket list, name tags are always ready, even if they haven’t told us they’re coming,” she said.

And it’s not just her. When visitors arrive, it’s all hands on deck. The rest of the recruiting staff is involved in welcoming and guiding visitors around.

Director of creative media: Alex McMurtry

It’s impossible to ignore the growing role visual media plays in recruiting. What started as a luxury at big-time Power 5 programs became a necessity throughout the FBS. From flashy graphics sent to recruits to tricked-out photo shoots that an Oklahoma State staffer called “the most important thing on these visits,” winning in recruiting means having a robust creative department.

Lashlee hired Alex McMurtry, formerly the director of graphic design at Missouri, to lead that effort for SMU football.

Though her expertise is in graphic design, McMurtry oversees everything visual that touches the team, including photo shoots and customized graphics for recruits, videos, and flashy art for social media. She’s working on the staff’s billboard campaign. She manages a team of students that help across multiple mediums.

She works closely with Bobby Brown to manage the many requests. The two share a Google Sheet that lists descriptions and due dates. If a coach wants a custom graphic for a four-star prospect, chances are it can be found there. The work varies depending on the request. A five-star recruit’s graphic will likely be more personalized than that for a preferred walk-on.

“We can’t make a custom graphic for 150 kids,” she said. “That’s all I would do. Some places do that, but it leads to burnout.”

McMurtry prefers quality over quantity and has established her own system for organizing who gets what. Managing workload is important not just for her and her staff, but for quality control.

“I’d rather give a kid an amazing graphic that I spent a week on to make rather than something that someone asked me to do in 20 minutes,” McMurtry said.

During visits, the photo shoots are their own beast. At SMU, there’s a studio, but the staff can also stage a shoot in the indoor practice facility, which takes time: 20-30 minutes to set up the backdrop and lighting, and the shoot itself can take anywhere from 20 minutes to up to an hour. Then there’s another 20 minutes to take everything down plus another hour or two of editing, depending on how many prospects are involved in a shoot in a given day.

McMurtry and her staff will also have a key role on game days, when a team’s social media presence is strong, and signing days, which are showcases for new signees with graphics, highlight videos, the works. Some of that work never sees the light of day if a recruit is making a last-minute decision and chooses a different school.

“We call it the graphics graveyard, where things go to die and never come back,” she said.

Recently, she designed the team’s pro day graphics for social media.

PRO DAY 2022. TOMORROW. #PonyUpDallas | #SMU2NFL pic.twitter.com/w9moBEhxWv

— SMU FootbaII (@SMUFB) March 24, 2022

McMurtry’s team will also be involved in SMU’s upcoming $100 million end zone complex, making sure it’s visually appealing for players, coaches, recruits and donors.

Senior assistant for player development and ‘Dallas recruiting relations’: Scott Nady

Under Dykes, SMU rebranded itself as Dallas’ college football program to great success. It paid off in recruiting and created a buzz on social media, from the “Triple D” logo to the script “Dallas” on SMU’s jerseys.

Scott Nady, who joined SMU under Dykes and remains under Lashlee, is there to make sure it’s not just marketing slogans and talk and that the program takes those efforts to an even higher level.

“I’ve been to Fort Worth five times in my life, and I’m 50,” said Nady, who was born and raised in Dallas. “Four of them were to play football games and the other was to go to the zoo with my daughter.

“I was born in Dallas, raised in Dallas and I’m gonna die in Dallas.”

I was born in Dallas, I live in Dallas & I’ll die in Dallas! The Triple D is more than just a logo or marketing campaign to me, it’s my life! It’s my intention to stay right here on The Hilltop defending what we’ve built & loving this Great Family! #PonyUpDallas🔴🔵 pic.twitter.com/2VSJateCor

— Scott X. Nady (@CoachNady) November 28, 2021

Nady, a former local high school football coach at Parish Episcopal, heads up what he calls the “Dallas Dream Team,” which includes Nady, Jourdan Blake and Danny Wesley. The latter two are assistant directors, Wesley for “Dallas community relations” and Blake for “Dallas recruiting operations.”

“All of us are in charge of locking down Dallas,” Nady said.

Nady’s official title is senior assistant for player development, which is key for the current team. Whether it’s providing personal, mental or emotional support, or helping players land internships or network or simply being available for any immediate needs, Nady fills that role. The rest of his duties are focused on courting his home city, which is why Lashlee added “Dallas recruiting relations” to his business card.

Nady patterns his philosophy after Howard Schnellenberger’s “State of Miami” approach from the 1980s Hurricanes: know more about the players in your backyard than anyone else. For SMU, that means the Dallas Dream Team digs into 11 counties in and around the city.

“If we don’t know the kid or the coach, then we know their cousin or their uncle or their brother,” Nady said. “If there’s somebody in Dallas that none of us have a connection to, we’re probably being catfished.”

Like the others in the recruiting department, Nady, Blake and Wesley are thorough. They don’t just want to know who the top junior and sophomore recruits are. They want to know the freshmen and the eighth graders they need to keep an eye out for, and they rely on a network of contacts to keep them abreast. Nady’s background as a 14-year Texas high school coach gives him access to a fraternity that is necessary, given the significant weight the Texas High School Coaches Association carries.

Nady and Blake, who also worked for Dykes, helped establish the team’s local identity. “We go out in the streets every Thursday, all over South Dallas with a handful of tickets, making sure every barbershop, barbecue spot, every Boys and Girls Club, every YMCA got as many tickets as they need,” Nady said. Former SMU running backs coach Ra’Shaad Samples, a dynamite recruiter who briefly went to TCU before recently accepting the same position with the Los Angeles Rams, told The Athletic last year that Blake was a huge help in landing commitments from local four-star prospects Jordan Hudson and Chace Biddle (after Dykes and Samples went to TCU, both Hudson and Biddle signed with the Horned Frogs).

The trio meets in the mornings, updates their local recruiting board with relevant information, evaluates film of prospects and spends plenty of time on the phone with high school coaches, 7-on-7 coaches, anyone who can help with background information on a local recruit. They also have a “next up” board for future classes. “I’ve got one guy right now on my 2026 board,” Nady said.

To Lashlee, it’s important to have a wing of recruiting dedicated solely to the city.

“If we’re gonna say we’re Dallas’ team and continue ‘Pony Up Dallas,’ that helped rebrand us, having Scott lead that here is important,” Lashlee said. “Yes, they’re going to help in recruiting everywhere, but their focus is Dallas.”

Other key areas

Believe it or not, SMU’s recruiting staff isn’t complete. Lashlee is still seeking the aforementioned high school relations director, which is a critical role in Texas. For now, Alex Brown, Bobby Brown and the Dallas Dream Team keep that line of communication open with high school coaches, as does the on-field coaching staff.

All told, with full-timers, interns and student workers included, SMU’s recruiting department consists of more than 20 people. Still, NCAA rules allow only the head coach and 10 on-field assistants on the road to see prospects in-person, off campus and make in-home visits. Lashlee was strategic in that area too.

Craig Naivar, SMU’s special teams coordinator and safeties coach, has more than two decades of experience recruiting the state, including stops at Houston, Texas and Texas State. Former Oklahoma defensive line coach Calvin Thibodeaux, who assumed the same title at SMU, also has extensive ties across Texas. Running backs coach Khenon Hall, a Dallas native and rising star who graduated from South Oak Cliff High, knows the city as well as anyone. It’s those 10 coaches who will see and speak to the prospects and their families the most, and they’re still the ones who can make or break a recruitment. But a well-stocked personnel department like SMU’s gives those on-field coaches an added edge.

The other missing piece here is name, image and likeness. There are no spaces on a college staff for it because, per NCAA rules, “coaches really can’t have anything to do with it,” Lashlee said. That is handled by donors and boosters, or at least it’s supposed to be. Recruiting inducements are no-nos in the NCAA’s eyes, and Texas law also bars high school athletes from monetizing their NIL, which is why current Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers reclassified and enrolled at Ohio State early. Collectives have popped up around the country, including at SMU, where in December a group of boosters pledged to fund one (multiple former SMU players, including Eric Dickerson, had their names attached to it).

“We can educate them,” Lashlee said. “But the hard truth is we have to stay disconnected from it because of the rules. Fortunately, we’re at a place where people really want SMU football to do well and they believe it’s important to do right by our players.”

Everything else, Lashlee has staffed as well as he can.

“You’ve got to have good players on your team. It doesn’t matter how well you coach,” Lashlee said. “If I’m going to invest the most amount of full-time positions and resources, I want to invest it in recruiting.”

(Photos courtesy of SMU Athletics)