MARQUETTE – Wednesday was a big day around the Upper Peninsula as Northern Michigan and Michigan Tech universities announced their recruiting classes for National Letter of Intent signing day.

The Wildcats landed 35 recruits, including five from the U.P., while Tech inked 29 with four of them native Yoopers.

The one quality overall that NMU head coach Chris Ostrowsky and his staff were looking for was leadership, while another was how they perform academically.

“We signed 17 guys that were captains on their team, 32 of the 35 are all-conference players, 25 were all-state and seven were state champions,” Ostrowsky said. “We wanted winners and when you talk about a state championship captain, you’re talking about a young man that understands what it takes to win and understands the sacrifice.

“The blueprint for me was recruiting guys who are articulate in the classroom. We were able to do that with an overall (grade-point average) of 2.95 with this group with an average ACT score of 20. That’s pretty good in regard to scholarship football.

“We’re a hair under 3.0 (GPA) and we want to win this conference with a football team GPA of 3.0 and we were as good as anyone in America at everything.

“It was really important in regard of quality is getting leaders. Good people in the classroom and getting guys that play the game in a dynamic fashion that have sudden, twitch movements.

“When you watch the highlight film, you’re going to see some guys that can make plays, that do great things when the ball is in their hands, guys that are physical on defense.”

Northern got one area player, Marquette quarterback Scott Tripp (5-foot-11, 195 pounds) who is currently listed under the versatile tag of “athlete,” as is Escanaba’s Logan Lamb (5-11, 185). Lamb earned All-U.P. accolades twice along with setting the school record for carries in a game.

“Both guys have that ‘it’ quality,” Ostrowsky said. “When we recruited Austin Young from Escanaba, four years ago now, he was a quarterback, but you just knew he had that special thing and we just had to find where he would fit.

“I think Logan as well as Scott bring that. They have a great workman-like attitude. They got to work and they do the types of things to be successful. They’re great character players. We’re excited for those guys in regard to our local players.”

A key focus during the recruiting process was the defensive line and the Wildcats got three good ones from around the U.P.

“We’ve got to be dominant up front,” Ostrowsky said. “If you look at the Alabamas of the world, you see a constant flow of football players in and out on the defensive line. We went out and signed 10 defensive linemen and they are really dominant guys. It’s a dominant class and we’re expecting them to come in and contribute to what is a great group right now, but we thought that was really important.”

One of the U.P. linemen recruits is Munising’s Brett Johnson (6-foot-1, 215), who was a member of the Mustangs’ 2014 state runner-up team and was selected to the All-U.P. team. The two other Yoopers are Jacob Lefebvre of Iron Mountain (6-3, 205 pounds) and Derek Crane of Sault Ste. Marie (6-1, 250).

“I thought Brett was clearly the cream of the crop there this season,” Ostrowsky said. “We’re excited for Brett and his family. They committed really early in the process.”

On offense, NMU added two more quarterbacks to its roster, a running back, two H-backs, five wide receivers and four offensive linemen. Defensively, the Wildcats landed five linebackers and four defensive backs, and seven other defensive linemen.

“We think we’re going to have upwards of 80 to 85 players return, which is an unbelievable number for us,” Ostrowsky said.

The Huskies have two Marquette County players, Ishpeming quarterback Ozzy Corp (6-5, 200), and Westwood linebacker Brandon Benda (6-1, 190). He was on the All-Mid-Peninsula First Team in 2015 as a linebacker, and in 2014 as a running back and linebacker.

Other U.P. signees for the Huskies were defensive linemen Ian McInnis (6-0, 280) from Munising and Lucas Klein (6-1, 220) of Houghton, who played for Lake Linden-Hubbell.

Ryan Stieg can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 246. His email address is rstieg@miningjournal.net.