Nebraska BCR in Big Ten

After seeing an article on 247 about college football BCR (Blue Chip Ratio), I couldn’t find Nebraska’s so I decided to calculate it myself. In the article, the writer pointed out that no team with a BCR below 50% has won the national championship since they started calculating it. Well, bad news, Nebraska is not winning a national championship anytime soon as the team BCR sits at 24.71% going into this season.

But, there is reason to hope for Nebraska. Although the in the field results for Scott Frost have been underwhelming so far, the recruiting has been living up to the hype. That 24.71% BCR for this 2020 season is actually tied for the highest BCR Nebraska football has had since 247 started keeping track of recruiting rankings. The year by year breakdown for Nebraska’s seasons in the Big Ten.

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|Year|BCR|
|:-|:-|
|2011|20%|
|2012|22.35%|
|2013|24.71%|
|2014|23.53%|
|2015|23.53%|
|2016|22.35%|
|2017|21.18%|
|2018|21.18%|
|2019|22.35%|
|2020|24.71%|

As you can see, Nebraska has stayed at a pretty consistent BCR throughout the decade. Essentially, Nebraska has 4 more blue chips on its 2020 roster than it had in 2011. The slightly growing BCR may not seem all that significant, but it is the youth of Nebraska’s blue chips that is intriguing. Of the 21 blue chips on Nebraska’s roster, 15 are freshmen and sophomores. Nebraska is also averaging 7.3 blue chip recruits per class under Frost, up from the 4.6 average under Riley and the 5.6 average under Pelini. Frost’s first 3 classes for Nebraska is the best average for blue chips since the 2011-2013 classes when Nebraska averaged 8 blue chips per class, coming off back to back appearances in the Big 12 title game while Frost inherited a team coming off its worst season in decades.

Obviously, the number of blue chips on your roster doesn’t mean you will automatically translate to more wins on the field and just because you have more of them doesn’t mean you’ll beat a team that doesn’t. But, it is worth pointing out that of the 6 blue chip upperclassmen, 4 are starters and the others are Juco transfer Omar Manning and Kheem Green, who sat out last season as a Juco redshirt.

One thing that will be interesting to follow is Nebraska’s retention rate of its blue chips, those 2011-2013 classes were the best 3 year stretch Nebraska had this decade, but on average, less than 50% of those blue chips finished their career at Nebraska.

So, what does all of this mean? Honestly, who knows? In theory, more blue chips should mean more talent in Frost’s system which leads to more wins. Thing is, Nebraska won’t see a huge in flux in blue chip upperclassmen for at least a couple more seasons if they can retain these classes. Unless they land a blue chip Juco transfer Nebraska will move from having 6 blue chip upperclassmen in 2020 to 7 blue chip upperclassmen in 2021. So, on the field success in the near future depends upon fast development of young players.

Oh, and for those interested in the rest of the B1G West BCR for 2020

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|Team|BCR|
|:-|:-|
|Illinois|11.76%|
|Wisconsin|9.41%|
|Iowa|5.88%|
|Purdue|5.88%|
|Minnesota|4.71%|
|Northwestern|3.53%|

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