As the 2016-2017 season kicks off this evening, we wanted to share the final 2016 Recruiting Class Rankings with college hockey coaches, players and fans. The interactive rankings can be viewed by subscribers under the Team Rankings tab. There you can see who is committed to these schools, what their individual star ratings are as well as scouting reports and player profiles.
Each player has been evaluated by our scouting staff. Our scouting staff (28 scouts from across North America) use a very structured ranking system and cross-reference each player evaluation to assure the highest quality and accuracy. While the algorithm used to rank recruiting classes is heavily weighted on each individual players’ star rating; it also weighs other factors such as age and the most recent league the player comes from. These factors are weighted precisely by the same values we derived from historical NCAA Division 1 Men’s Hockey data on freshman production, dating back to 2005.
Below are the recruiting class rankings for the upcoming season. Below that, is a screenshot of our Team Rankings page to give non-subscribers an idea of what it looks like.
Please keep in mind that the total points, which determines the ranking, are determined by a multitude of factors, mainly each individual players star rating. We chose to share the star rating average because it gives you and idea of the quality vs quantity measurement. It is, however, completely independent of the total points. For example, if one school had a 3 star commit and a 5 star commit it would have a different point total than two 4-star players, even though their number of commits are the same and their average star rating would be the same.
| Rank | Team | # of Commits | Avg. Star Rating | Points |
| 1 | Boston University | 9 | 4.33 | 1,594.03 |
| 2 | Michigan | 11 | 4.2 | 1,391.63 |
| 3 | Miami (Ohio) | 14 | 3.84 | 1,184.56 |
| 4 | Boston College | 13 | 3.94 | 1,174.07 |
| 5 | Providence | 10 | 4.13 | 1,173.05 |
| 6 | North Dakota | 8 | 4.06 | 960.44 |
| 7 | Northeastern | 8 | 4.03 | 950.15 |
| 8 | Penn State | 9 | 3.93 | 930.52 |
| 9 | Minnesota-Duluth | 8 | 4.00 | 908.83 |
| 10 | St. Cloud | 9 | 4.00 | 902.8 |
| 11 | Michigan State | 10 | 3.88 | 895.96 |
| 12 | Western Michigan | 8 | 4.03 | 885.39 |
| 13 | Notre Dame | 8 | 4.09 | 884.16 |
| 14 | UMass Lowell | 9 | 3.89 | 842.42 |
| 15 | Harvard | 9 | 3.94 | 825.22 |
| 16 | Clarkson | 8 | 3.91 | 814.89 |
| 17 | Vermont | 9 | 3.83 | 810.25 |
| 18 | Minnesota State | 8 | 3.88 | 755.35 |
| 19 | Michigan Tech | 10 | 3.68 | 726.21 |
| 20 | Arizona State | 8 | 3.88 | 711.71 |
| 21 | Minnesota | 5 | 4.25 | 697.49 |
| 22 | Nebraska-Omaha | 7 | 3.96 | 665.66 |
| 23 | Yale | 9 | 3.75 | 659.23 |
| 24 | Maine | 10 | 3.63 | 635.14 |
| 25 | Wisconsin | 6 | 3.92 | 633.29 |
| 26 | Alaska-Fairbanks | 11 | 3.55 | 625.54 |
| 27 | Ohio State | 5 | 4.1 | 597.36 |
| 28 | New Hampshire | 7 | 3.79 | 578.55 |
| 29 | RPI | 10 | 3.48 | 569.21 |
| 30 | Bowling Green | 8 | 3.66 | 567.83 |
| 31 | Colorado | 10 | 3.55 | 554.09 |
| 32 | Union | 8 | 3.81 | 540.62 |
| 33 | Denver | 7 | 3.82 | 511.92 |
| 34 | Ferris St | 8 | 3.66 | 511.86 |
| 35 | AIC | 13 | 3.27 | 501.68 |
| 36 | Bentley | 9 | 3.5 | 492.26 |
| 37 | Cornell | 5 | 3.9 | 473.85 |
| 38 | Sacred Heart | 8 | 3.59 | 468.96 |
| 39 | Dartmouth | 11 | 3.39 | 458.29 |
| 40 | Colgate | 9 | 3.53 | 457.74 |
| 41 | Northern Michigan | 6 | 3.71 | 455.32 |
| 42 | Massachusetts | 8 | 3.56 | 449.69 |
| 43 | Canisius | 7 | 3.75 | 444.46 |
| 44 | Robert Morris | 10 | 3.35 | 427.36 |
| 45 | Lake Superior | 8 | 3.5 | 411.51 |
| 46 | Connecticut | 6 | 3.5 | 388.21 |
| 47 | Merrimack | 8 | 3.5 | 367.52 |
| 48 | Quinnipiac | 6 | 3.63 | 360.6 |
| 49 | RIT | 7 | 3.43 | 354.97 |
| 50 | Holy Cross | 9 | 3.33 | 353.16 |
| 51 | Bemidji | 6 | 3.58 | 352.61 |
| 52 | Niagara | 9 | 3.31 | 336.12 |
| 53 | Air Force | 9 | 3.25 | 312.7 |
| 54 | Brown | 7 | 3.43 | 308.23 |
| 55 | Princeton | 6 | 3.46 | 297.96 |
| 56 | St. Lawrence | 7 | 3.34 | 296.37 |
| 57 | Army | 7 | 3.29 | 276.31 |
| 58 | Alaska-Anchorage | 7 | 3.32 | 272.62 |
| 59 | Mercyhurst | 5 | 3.5 | 247.82 |
| 60 | Alabama Huntsville | 4 | 3.43 | 178.12 |
Disclaimers: We do not rank direct college transfers or red shirt freshman in our data. Also keep in mind that this is not an indication of coaches scouting ability. The top three schools in the ranking had a lot of scholarship money available heading into this recruiting season and have state of the art facilities. Some of the teams towards the bottom may not have had much scholarship availability or were only graduating role players and didn’t want to use scholarship money on their replacements. Our ranking doesn’t account for the level of scholarship the player received but any coach would tell you that a 3.5 star player who is full pay is more valuable than a 3.75 star player who is on a full scholarship.
Photo Credit: Dan Hickling/Hickling Images