As a freshman at Pentucket Regional High School in Massachusetts, Chris White had two brothers, Brian and Kevin, starting at quarterback and wide receiver, respectively, on the varsity football team. His father, Don, who played quarterback at Notre Dame in the late 1950s, coached and taught at nearby Belmont High School.

After Brian graduated, he played quarterback at Harvard. He left there as the No. 2 career passing leader and began a successful college football coaching career. Kevin, by then an established tri-athlete, became a managing director for a major financial firm on Wall Street.

Stuck in a family of star athletes, it was hard for Chris to distinguish himself.

Yet, Chris is in his fifth year as tight ends coach at Syracuse. He takes over as recruiting coordinator after Jerry Azzinaro left SU to take a coaching job at Duke. White, who is responsible for the Virginia, Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia recruiting areas, is credited with 10 recruits in this year’s freshman class. He is in charge of the next generation, the one that must lead Syracuse back to national prominence.

‘The number of players he signs is phenomenal,’ said Jeff Horton, the quarterbacks coach at Wisconsin. ‘Four or five signings in one class is considered a very good year, but 10 guys? That just doesn’t happen in college football.’

In 1994, Horton, then the head coach at UNLV with wide receivers coach Brian White, recommended Chris for a head coaching job at Bishop Manogue, a high school in Reno, Nev. In White’s second season, he led Bishop Manogue to the division championship and was named Northern Nevada Coach of the Year.

It was enough of a tryout for Horton. The next year, he brought White aboard as a linebackers and special teams coach at UNLV. His brother, Brian, had already left for Wisconsin in 1995, though, where he currently serves as offensive coordinator.

‘(Chris and Brian White) grew up around football,’ Horton said. ‘They bring great personality to the staff and motivate the players. The kids trust them and believe in them.’

From there, Chris went on to work at Cal Poly for one year as defensive coordinator and special teams coach in 1999 before returning to Syracuse in 2000, where he was a graduate assistant from 1990 to 1992. At first, White worked as the special teams coordinator as well as the tight ends coach, but when Azzinaro left to become the defensive coordinator at Duke after last season, SU coach Paul Pasqualoni knew the man he wanted – Chris White.

After all, White was already credited with recruiting 15 players on SU’s roster in just his fourth season with the team.

‘Chris is very personable,’ Pasqualoni said. ‘He really likes people and he’s very persistent. He’s got a great approach to working with kids and recruiting kids. He’s got a real good handle on the big picture of recruiting.’

Horton agreed.

‘There are a lot of phony people in this business,’ Horton said. ‘Chris is a breath of fresh air. He works hard.

‘Kids probably think us old guys are full of crap, but Chris can really connect with them.’

With today’s Internet recruiting services that assist schools in tracking prospects nationwide, young and energetic people like White are the difference between a commitment and a missed opportunity. White and the other SU coaches, who split the country into recruiting regions, are extremely busy between February and May when coaches can contact high school players.

‘In years past, you were starting your recruiting (in the summer),’ White said. ‘During the season, you’re trying to find the guys you want to recruit, so you can make phone calls every week and zero in on those guys. So right now it’s easier, but the months of February through May are the months we’re really working hard in.’

The Internet has also made the recruiting process less secretive – it gives coaches and players a chance to check up on one another, White said.

‘I scan that thing every morning,’ White said. ‘The first thing I do is turn the computer on and get on to Rivals.com. I look at what a kid is saying on that thing. Sometimes you say, ‘Does he really mean it?’ But, you’ve got to take those things with a grain of salt and sometimes you’ve got to read between the lines.’

Another difference in today’s match of recruiting chess is players are more athletic and versatile, White said. High school offensive players are switching to defense in college and vice versa. These players, who can play multiple positions, are often designated as ‘athletes’ on Internet recruiting services.

‘We were one of the first schools to really recruit that athlete – guys like Kevin Johnson,’ White said of the quarterback turned receiver. ‘We want to take the best athletes possible. Ironically, a lot of those guys are quarterbacks, because they’ve always got the ball in their hands, and running backs, because a lot of high school programs can’t throw.

Coaches struggle in identifying defensive backs, because most films focus on lines, leaving the defensive backfields out of the frame.

So SU coaches often look at what recruits do in off-season sports like basketball and track to better gauge their athleticism, White said. White decided to offer junior linebacker Kellen Pruitt a scholarship after seeing him play point guard for his high school basketball team in suburban Maryland.

Still, White looks forward to the next few years when he’ll see whether or not his recruiting crop will pan out.

White could not have been promoted to his new position at a more difficult time for Syracuse. With Miami and Virginia Tech departed for the Atlantic Coast Conference and Boston College on the way out next year, the conference’s perception is at a new low while SU is on a 10-14 slide over the past two seasons.

‘I bet it has made things harder to recruit,’ Horton said. ‘But I’m sure Big East programs have a plan to go against (the departures).’

‘Recruiting is very competitive,’ Pasqualoni said. ‘I think losing Miami takes a little of the luster out of the Big East, but the Big East is a big place, and it’s still a BCS conference. I don’t think kids choose conferences over individual teams.’

Pittsburgh head coach Walt Harris agreed that not all was lost when the door slammed shut on the two departed foes.

‘Being able to recruit with a Miami in the league was a positive,’ Harris said. ‘Once they left, we had all the doomsayers come out. It hasn’t been that bad.’

Meanwhile, all White can do is focus on those that are interested in SU.

He talks with Brian two or three times a week, he said. Often they discuss where they will be five or 10 years from now.

‘Everyone aspires to be a coordinator of an offense or defense and then eventually become a head coach,’ White said. ‘That’s the progression you go through.’

Published on September 1, 2004 at 12:00 pm