Recruiting impact: First-time coach DeMarcus Van Dyke is already proven as a recruiter
It would have been impossible for DeMarcus Van Dyke to know he was meeting one of South Florida’s next great safeties the first time he met Kamren Kinchens. The defensive back was just a kid at the time and certainly a potential star playing at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Miami’s Northwest Club, but his decorated career at Miami Northwestern was a long way off and college football coaches couldn’t yet fawn over the future four-star recruit.
Van Dyke didn’t know what his future had in store, either. His playing days for the Miami Hurricanes were just about at their end and a six-year NFL career was on the horizon. His first coaching job — as cornerbacks coach for ASA College, a junior college in Miami — wouldn’t come until 2017. He wouldn’t return to Miami until 2018, when he first took an off-the-field role before being promoted to cornerbacks coach last Thursday. Once he was back, his deep roots in Miami-Dade County made him a secret weapon in the Hurricanes’ recruiting efforts.
“Us being from the same city, we played at the same Optimist park,” said Kinchens, who was Miami-Dade County’s Co-Defensive Player of the Year for Classes 2A-5A in 2019, according to the Miami Herald. “His whole thing was the boys club to the U to the NFL.”
Van Dyke’s promotion from assistant recruiting director to assistant coach was made with an eye — at least in part — to his potential ability to elevate the Hurricanes’ recruiting efforts in the secondary.
In the 2021 College Football Playoff National Championship at Hard Rock Stadium on Jan. 11, six of the starting defensive backs were from Florida, including four from South Florida for the Alabama Crimson Tide.
The Hurricanes missed out on All-American cornerback Patrick Surtain II, who starred at Plantation American Heritage, and lost a commitment from star cornerback Josh Jobe at the last moment in the Class of 2018. They lost out on Lauderdale Lakes Boyd Anderson’s Daniel Wright in the Class of 2017. They botched the recruitment of Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas’ Jordan Battle in the Class of 2019.
Miami’s secondary was an issue at times throughout the 2020 season, and there’s no excuse for the group to lack talent given the Hurricanes’ recruiting footprint. Although he has never led a recruitment or visited a school, Van Dyke already has an encouraging track record.
Kinchens repeatedly credited his relationship with Van Dyke as a reason he picked Miami over the Auburn Tigers last year, and the new position coach was also instrumental in getting five-star American Heritage safety James Williams to pick the Hurricanes over the Georgia Bulldogs.
Williams is the 14th-highest ranked player to sign a national letter of intent with Miami in the past 20 years, according to the 247Sports.com composite rankings.
One of coach Manny Diaz’s many staff changes he made when he took over in the final days of 2018 was to reshuffle the recruiting department. He moved Van Dyke from defensive quality control analyst to assistant recruiting director in 2019, and the Hurricanes’ recruiting efforts turned around almost immediately
Miami’s 2019 recruiting class finished ranked outside the top 25. Its Class of 2020 finished at No. 16 after the Hurricanes landed safety Avantae Williams, a top-50 recruit, on National Signing Day. Its Class of 2021 currently ranks No. 11. Miami has landed five blue-chip defensive backs in the last two recruiting cycles with Van Dyke’s help.
“It was just a great move that UM made for him and he had so much to do with so a lot of people coming,” Kinchens said, “and recruiting on the offensive and defensive side.”
