What B1G things did we learn from the first day of the Early Signing Period?

Conferences titles were won, Heisman Trophies were earned and everyone took home a national championship.

OK, so the first day of the Early Signing Period wasn’t that epic, but it was plenty interesting. There were a whole bunch of kids who signed their letters of intent. In fact, as of 4 p.m. ET, the B1G signed 256 recruits. That’s an average of 18 signees per school.

In other words, get ready for an extremely boring February Signing Day. Maybe “boring” is the wrong word. Perhaps “uneventful” is the better word.

That’s not a slight at the recruits who chose to wait until February. There’s nothing wrong with that. They’re just in the minority. Big time.

In fact, every B1G school already had the majority of their verbal commitments signed by 4 p.m. ET on Wednesday. Schools like Indiana, Maryland, Michigan State, Minnesota, Ohio State, Penn State and Purdue — that’s half the conference — already had 20-plus commitments by 4 p.m. on Day 1.

What did that show us? Signing on the first Wednesday possible is what all the cool kids are doing.

Here are some other things that we learned about the B1G’s first day of the Early Signing Period:

Ohio State has some big-time competition for No. 1

Any thought that the Buckeyes would cruise to the top-ranked class all but vanished by the middle of Wednesday afternoon.

Part of that became a reality when 5-star offensive tackle Jackson Carman committed to Clemson instead of Ohio State and USC (I’ll get to more on him later). And while Ohio State did flip 4-star receiver Cameron Brown from Nebraska, it was a relatively quiet day on the “new addition” front.

Georgia, meanwhile, did some serious heavy lifting. The Dawgs signed a total of six 5-star recruits on Wednesday alone. Half of those six committed to the Dawgs on Wednesday, including former Ohio State commit Brenton Cox. Clearly, Georgia was the winner of the first day of the Early Signing Period.

As of 4:30 p.m. ET, here’s how close the race for No. 1 is (via 247sports):

It would be a big lift if Ohio State didn’t lose a commitment from 5-star safety Jaiden Woodbey, who is now projected to end up at Florida State in the 247sports crystal ball. Adding another top-100 recruit like 4-star defensive end Tyreke Smith would be key for the Buckeyes, too.

Remember, there’s still the February Signing Day. There’s still a good chance that Ohio State could fend off Georgia’s impressive late push as long as Kirby Smart doesn’t land any more 5-star recruits.

And let’s not overlook the class that Tom Herman put together in his first full recruiting cycle at Texas. The Buckeyes have assembled the nation’s top class despite the fact that Herman either signed or has commitments from seven of the top-10 recruits in the state of Texas, where Ohio State used to pluck big-time talent.

This could easily be a three-team race down to the wire, but as of right now, OSU is still holding on.

James Franklin is playing with the big boys now

James Franklin just lost the most valuable coach on his staff and he’s about to lose a once-in-a-generation player. So what did he do? He went out and signed what looks like it’ll be the top-rated class in Penn State history.

The Lions look like a lock to finish somewhere between 3-7 (maybe even better than Alabama) with a couple of potential 4-star targets still on the board. The biggest addition to Franklin’s 2018 class came via 5-star defensive end Micah Parsons, who announced that he was coming to Penn State after all.

The time has come I’m officially committed !!! #H2O I want want thank God for this amazing opportunity!🙏🏽🤞🏽 pic.twitter.com/n17h2nu058

— BLESSEDMVP (@Micah_parsons23) December 20, 2017

Parsons might’ve been the biggest recruiting victory of Franklin’s time at Penn State (stealing Saquon Barkley from Rutgers wasn’t exactly the same kind of battle). Few people on planet earth beat Georgia in a down-to-the-wire decision, and Franklin was one of them.

Penn State also flipped 4-star receiver Jahan Dotson from UCLA, which gave the Lions 12 signees rated 4 stars or better. That’s already more than last year.

And including Parsons, Penn State finished Wednesday with three 5-star recruits signed. Franklin had signed one 5-star recruit in his first four classes in Happy Valley.

Times are indeed a changing, and in a good way for Franklin and Co.

Apparently Urban Meyer is…nearing the end?

In case you somehow missed it, 5-star offensive tackle Jackson Carman made two surprising announcements on Wednesday. The first of which was that he was signing with Clemson and not the Buckeyes, which marked the first time in 10 years that the top-ranked recruit in the state of Ohio didn’t end up in Columbus.

The other thing he said was a bit more revealing. This quote has been all over the internet today:

Dabo Swinney told Jackson Carman during his recruitment that Urban Meyer is on the back end of his career in terms of years left. “It wasn’t a major factor, but it was an underlying one,” Carman said.

— Ari Wasserman (@AriWasserman) December 20, 2017

That’s, um, interesting. Meyer is 53 years old while Swinney is a youthful 48. My initial takeaway was that was an odd bit of negative recruiting against a coach that Swinney just beat 31-0 a short 12 months ago. Negative recruiting happens, and that’s not new.

But is there any merit to Swinney’s claim? A claim that when asked about it later, he didn’t ncecessarily deny. Certainly Ohio State fans don’t want to think about a post-Meyer world, but he has been a head coach for 16 years and he’s been coaching for 33 of the last 34 years of his life. That obviously adds up.

There’s no guarantee that Meyer, who talked away from the profession once before, is still going strong at 66 like Nick Saban. OSU fans would be thrilled about having Meyer in Columbus until 2030 (that looks weird).

Ultimately, Swinney doesn’t know and Meyer probably doesn’t even know how many years he has left coaching. Based on OSU’s No. 1 class, which didn’t need Carman’s commitment to get to that spot, it doesn’t look like Meyer is slowing down anytime soon.

P.J. Fleck and Jeff Brohm crushed their first full recruiting cycle

I always hold off judgment on first-year coaches for one big reason. They haven’t had their recruits come in and play yet. The first full recruiting cycle tells a lot about a coach’s future.

And if I’m a Minnesota or Purdue fan, I’m fired up about what I saw Wednesday.

Fleck, who got plenty of criticism for the amount of offers his staff gave out, signed 25 recruits on Wednesday. At No. 29 nationally as of 5:30 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Minnesota is in line to finish with its top-ranked class in school history. For a program that finished in the top 40 once in the past 10 years, that’s awfully impressive.

More impressive was Fleck’s ability to close on so many of his verbal commitments (25). There was no waffling in his class, which is a good sign about his ability to recruit.

And even though Purdue only ranks No. 47 nationally, signing 22 recruits on Wednesday was critical. Jeff Brohm is still in line to do some more work before February. His biggest recruit yet could be getting former Texas commit and 4-star receiver Rondale Moore, who the 247sports crystal ball projects to end up at Purdue.

The Boilers haven’t even finished with a top-60 class since 2012. That’s looking like a definite possibility, as is Purdue finishing with its best class of the last decade.

It appears that Brohm and Fleck aren’t having any problems establishing new cultures at their respective programs.

Connor O'Gara

Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Tradition. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.