Michigan State Football: Saeed Khalif is home run hire for Mel Tucker

If there’s one thing Michigan State football fans can’t really complain about concerning Mel Tucker, it’s his hiring of assistants and other personnel.

On Monday, he made a huge hire after losing Scott Aligo to Kansas, striking a deal with Wisconsin’s Saeed Khalif as the new director of player personnel. No casual college football fans know other programs’ players of personnel, but this is a great hire for Tucker as Khalif was responsible for a lot of the recruiting success Wisconsin has had.

Khalif helped Wisconsin recruit their best classes in program history over the past four years, going from No. 46 in his first year, to mid-20s in years 2-3, and then No. 16 in the 2021 class.

Not too shabby.

Michigan State’s first class under Tucker was ranked somewhere in the 40s but Aligo helped reel in 15 transfers which make up for the average recruiting class. But people don’t realize the 40s isn’t too bad for a first-year coach who wasn’t allowed to recruit in person.

With Khalif in town and with his background, it looks like it’d be a surprise if Michigan State wasn’t in the 30s in the recruiting landscape in 2022 and then in the 20s in 2023 and beyond.

Michigan State football recruiting about to explode?

The NCAA’s dead period is officially over — it’s lasted since last March — and Tucker is getting his first crack at recruiting in person. We’ve seen him recruit well with no in-person contact for over a year and now his “recruit every day” mindset is really about to pay off.

When he can finally host recruits and travel to visit recruits, things will get even better for Michigan State’s football recruiting and now Tucker is adding one of the top recruiters in the Big Ten.

Aligo had a big hand in Michigan State landing 15 quality transfers this offseason but Khalif has a background and proven success with high school prospects.

If he can help Wisconsin land a top-20 recruiting class, imagine what he’ll do in East Lansing.