LITTLE ROCK — Have you ever wondered who started the college football/basketball recruiting information craze?
The answer would be Joe Terranova of Dearborn, Mich.
Terranova, a former Ford Motor Company executive, got it all started in the late 1960s while attending graduate school at the University of Illinois.
His interest in recruiting grew out of his love of reading newspapers at the university library.
"I use to read the newspapers from everywhere," said Terranova, who received his undergraduate degree in 1964 from Notre Dame. "And it kind of struck me in looking at the papers around the country that kids that made the all-state teams didn't necessarily turn out to be college material.
"So over a period of time, I got acquainted with some of the college coaches and they seemed willing to talk because no one ever did that before. I kind of built up a list of honorable mention and all-state [teams] from newspapers from around the country.
"I actually started to trade my list for pretty much their [college coaches'] list over time. There was a lot of trust involved in it. That's how it [interest in recruiting] all started."
Terranova, now 66, then quite by accident got into recruiting reporting.
"One day, I happen to call John Travers, who was the sports editor at the Harrisburg [Pa.] Patriot-News after recruiting [season] was over," Terranovasaid. "And I asked him who Penn State had recruited. He filled me in on the list because the sports information departments didn't publish that stuff at that time. I said, 'I think they had the best class in the country' and he asked if I could write something for him."
On a lark, Terranova asked the editor to include a small blurb about a recruiting service along with his story.
"I said 'How 'bout a favor and put my address' [in the paper] that I have a [recruiting] service for two dollars, which I didn't have," he said.
Reader response, though, shocked Terranova.
"And he sends me a copy of the paper from Sunday and it's all [over] the front page," Terranova said. "There's 10 little paragraphs with 'The Top 100 players' and 'Penn State recruits best' and the next thing you know I had 400 [pairs] of one dollar bills or checks or whatever in the mail and I said, 'Oh my God.' "
Terranova quickly realized he'd just gotten into the recruiting business. So while still employed by Ford, Terranova started National Prep Publications, which he worked on at night.
"So I had to call every sports information department in the country and piece something together," Terranova said. "The first report came out a month after, and it kind of grew from there; the subscription list grew. My wife got involved with keeping a list of subscribers and doing the mailing. She would also call high schools for video so I could watch kids."
Terranova, who published three reports a year, first gained notoriety by including two quarterbacks that went on to have stellar college and NFL careers.
"I got the stamp of approval when I said [Dan] Marino and [John] Elway were the No. 1 and 2 quarterbacks coming out of high school," Terranova said.
Terranova's credibility was further bolstered by a relationship with former Ohio State assistant coach Alex Gibbs, who later coached at Auburn.
"I talked with a coach at Auburn that had coached with [former Ohio State Coach] Woody Hayes," Terranova said. "And I asked him how Auburn had recruited and he said, 'We have the Heisman Trophy winner.' I told Alex he had to be kidding. He then said Bo Jackson is the best player in the country."
"He said, 'We've never had a player like that here.' So I wrote Jackson was going to win the Heisman Trophy just because I really had faith in Alex's ability to judge talent, and then that came true and that really legitimized everything."
Terranova considers the early 1980s his career peak with approximately 6,500 subscribers, while claiming about 4,500 subscribers in 2000 when he ceased publishing the newsletter.
His status as the first recruiting guru also led to Terranova being mentioned in the bible of sports magazines, along with other perks.
"Sports Illustrated was kind enough to put it [recruiting reports] in for maybe a dozen years in their sports talk section," he said. "I did talk shows and I visited with coaches. Coaches would come by the house for dinner when they were out recruiting. For me, it was a labor of love. I worked for Ford and had a good job; it was a way for me to get away from the pressure of being in the auto business."
Terranova also had a 30-year partnership with Bruce Weber of Scholastic Coach magazine, which published high profile All-America teams.
"We started years and years ago with the Adidas High School All-American team," said Terranova, who also retired from working with Scholastic in 2006. "I did football and basketball for him [Weber] and then it turned into the Gatorade High School All-American team.
"That was another way for me to have doors open to me with college coaches. I think we had a string of over 25 years where one of the kids on our team won the Heisman trophy."
E-mail Richard Davenport at rdavenport@arkansasonline. com
Sports, Pages 21 on 10/23/2007