Michigan football team easily grabs No. 1 spot in Rivals' recruiting rankings
Each of the Michigan football team's top seven 2013 recruits fell in the Rivals rankings that were released earlier this week.
Two days later, the Wolverines still managed to be named Rivals' top overall class in the country.
The Wolverines, who were ranked No. 1 by Scout earlier this month, now have earned top billing according to both major recruiting services. And this one wasn't really close.
The gap between Michigan (2,316 points) and runner-up Texas (2,035) is wider than the gap between the Longhorns and fifth-place Florida.
Alabama (third) and Georgia (fourth) completed the top five.
The Wolverines easily beat each of their rivals, as Ohio State came in at seventh, Notre Dame ninth and Michigan State 30th.
Other Big Ten teams to make the Top 25 include Penn State (15th), Nebraska (18th) and Illinois (19th).
Michigan's grasp on the top spot likely is correlated to bagging 18 verbal commitments, the most in the country. Its average star rating is 3.72, which is worse than No. 2 Texas (3.86), No. 3 Alabama (3.79) and No. 7 Ohio State (4.00), among others.
That means as signing day approaches and class sizes even out, the Wolverines could be passed in the ranking. Of course, they still have room to add about six more prospects themselves.
Michigan doesn't have any five-star commitments according to Rivals, but its 13 four-star commits lead the country.
Its top-ranked player is quarterback Shane Morris (Warren DeLaSalle), who comes in at No. 22. He's the No. 2 quarterback in the country.
The strength of the class, though, is the guys charged with protecting Morris. Offensive linemen Chris Fox (57th), Patrick Kugler (73rd) and Kyle Bosch (77th) each rank among Rivals' top 100 overall players.
David Dawson (171st) and Logan Tuley-Tillman (235th) round out the offensive line class, which is the best in the country at this point.
For Rivals' complete 2013 team recruiting rankings, click here.
Kyle Meinke covers Michigan football for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at 734-623-2588, by email at kylemeinke@annarbor.com and followed on Twitter @kmeinke.
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