Column: The Signing Day that could have been and the day that will be

Today is National Signing Day for college football.

At the beginning of the school year, this day looked like it could have been one of the best signing days for IU in recent memory. We were supposed to have the No. 1 pro-style high-school quarterback, Gunner Kiel, in our recruiting class.

As most people probably now know, that is not happening.

The 2011 football season started with nothing but hope and high expectations. A new coach was supposed to invigorate a football program that hadn’t accomplished much since the first-year former coach Bill Lynch took over and the Hoosiers went to the
Insight Bowl.

Expectations were not met. IU’s football team was a disgrace. The team won just one game. They let three teams score more than 50 points and, at one point, lost to the team with the then-worst defense in NCAA Division-I football.

If I were Gunner Kiel, I would have decommitted, too. Can anyone really blame him?
He could have gone anywhere, but he was, at one point, willing to come to IU. There must have been something there to draw him, but the lackluster performance on the field turned him and, probably, other recruits away.

Now, the Hoosiers have another chance to recharge the football team.

Today, instead of Gunner Kiel, the Hoosiers will add two different quarterbacks to their roster. The first is Nathan Sudfeld from Modesto, Calif. According to Rivals.com, he is a three-star recruit. The other quarterback is Cameron Coffman, who comes from a junior college.

Clearly, neither of these players has the immediate potential for effect like Kiel could have. Maybe they will come in with a chip on their shoulder knowing that even though they weren’t the first choice, they can still make a difference.

As of Tuesday, IU had 25 members in the 2012 recruiting class, and unless IU Coach Kevin Wilson erased their memories of last year’s football season, they probably know what they are getting themselves into.

These high-school seniors and junior college transfers know they are coming into a program that needs help and guidance. We should hope they are willing to take whatever this coaching staff has to say to heart and make the changes that are necessary.

Those changes can’t just be put on the shoulders of the new kids. Unfortunately, there is a culture of losing when it comes to IU football. There is no way to avoid this situation or pretend it isn’t true.

Every season students, alumni and fans hope this will be the season the Hoosiers make it to a bowl game. They hope this is the season that watching IU on the football field isn’t painful, but exciting.

That change was supposed to come last year when we brought in a new coach, but it didn’t. It might take a few more years, and truthfully, it might be worth the wait. IU basketball took four years to turn the situation around, and we all know football has much farther to go than basketball did.

Maybe this signing class will be the one to change it. We can’t know for sure, but starting today and until Sept. 1, we can hope that it is.