By Kevin Connelly

kconnelly@vindy.com

Some families have more influence than others.

Take the British Royal Family for example. When global basketball icon LeBron James met Prince William and his wife Kate after a December game in New York, he posed for a photo with the royal couple. King James put his arm around the future queen of England, which caused a fuss since no commoner is supposed to touch members of the royal family.

(That’s probably the first time LeBron has been called a commoner since middle school.)

There’s also the Kennedys, the Clintons, the Bushs — heck, even the Kardashians can be considered influential in this self-made world.

But when it comes to Youngstown, the royal football families run deep. And this year, they’ve put their imprint on just about every Division I recruit that will be signing a national letter of intent to play college football today.

The families include the Marrows, the Stoops, the Pelinis and the Narduzzis.

At least one member of each family can be traced back to this year’s signing class.

A ‘DUZZI OF A RECRUITER

When L.J. Scott of Hubbard High School made a verbal commitment to Michigan State on Twitter in early July, there were a few names surrounding his decision.

The first was Spartans head coach Mark Dantonio. At the time, his lead assistant and recruiting guru was Pat Narduzzi. The Ursuline grad had built a reputation that he was as relentless a recruiter as he was a defensive coordinator.

One of the leaders of Narduzzi’s defense was Spartans safety — and Hubbard graduate — Kurtis Drummond. He and Scott developed a relationship during one of the many recruiting trips the 4-star running back made to East Lansing.

One could only assume the friendship the two developed — despite Drummond graduating — also helped the Spartans in keeping Scott when Narduzzi accepted the head coaching position at Pittsburgh the day after Christmas. Although, Scott wasn’t the only highly rated Valley running back Narduzzi was recruiting to the Big Ten.

Michigan State was one of three finalists for Austintown Fitch High back Darrin Hall. According to the recruiting service 247Sports.com, Scott and Hall are the top two ranked running backs in the state in this year’s class. Hall, who missed most of his senior season with a knee injury, committed to Pitt in August.

Hall was reportedly considering other options when Panthers head coach Paul Chryst bolted for Wisconsin, telling the Pittsburgh Tribune Review, “If [running backs coach John] Settle leaves, I’m out.”

Luckily for the Panthers, Narduzzi had a prior relationship with Hall and the two talked “a couple time a week” when he was still considering the Spartans. The day after Narduzzi was introduced at Pitt’s head coach, he reached out to Hall to shore up any concerns the back may have had.

Later that day, Hall tweeted “Just got off the phone with Pat. #H2P we will be great!! #thefuture”

Narduzzi is a name many people around the Valley already knew and area football coaches will be hearing a lot more from him.

MORE to-MARROW

Vince Marrow was a two-sport star at Cardinal Mooney High School in the late 1980s. On the Cardinals football team, he was teammates with Kentucky head coach Mark Stoops and first-year Youngstown State head coach Bo Pelini.

But more on Pelini’s homecoming later.

Coincidentally, Mooney’s cross-town rival Ursuline had a player by the name of Pat Narduzzi on its team.

As for Marrow, a brief playing career turned into coaching. What he found was a passion for recruiting, where he became quite successful in his home state.

He eventually landed at Nebraska as a graduate assistant under Pelini, who was the head coach at the time. But in 2012, Marrow joined his other high school teammate Stoops, when he was hired at Kentucky. That’s where he found his niche.

Marrow helped sign 11 Ohio prospects last year — a total of 21 Ohio players in all over the first two classes — including Youngstown Christian’s Tymere Dubose and Niles’ Josh Krok. Dubose’s head coach at YCS is Marrow’s brother, Brian.

(See, family ties do run deep in the Valley.)

In this year’s class, the Wildcats are getting the fourth-ranked linebacker in the state, Jordan Jones from Mooney, and a defensive lineman from Warren Harding High School, Javon Provitt.

Jones enrolled early at UK. Provitt made the decision to join Marrow last week over Narduzzi’s Panthers.

Just last month, Marrow signed a new multi-year contract to stay at Kentucky after turning down an offer to join Jim Harbaugh’s staff at Michigan. He was given a significant raise from Stoops for his loyalty — and ultimately his importance to the program.

POINT TO PELINI

For as many good things as former Youngstown State head coach Eric Wolford did for the program, he failed to fulfill two of the most important requirements to Valley football fans: win in November and recruit the area.

Whether new coach Bo Pelini can do the former won’t be known until later this year, however he’s off to a good start with fulfilling the latter. At least seven Valley players are expected to sign with the Penguins today.

The prize of the class is Hubbard athlete Isiah Scott, who gave a verbal to Pelini last Friday, before a scheduled visit to Marrow and the Wildcats. Scott’s decision to turn down a bigger program for the hometown school is something the Valley hasn’t seen in a while.

Wolford’s first two recruiting classes featured a lot of local recruits, although several of them were offered partial scholarships. He went away from that model in recent years, signing just four Valley players over his final three recruiting classes.

Pelini told The Vindicator’s Joe Scalzo in January that he plans to recruit Ohio and western Pennsylvania early. When asked what type of player he’s looking for, he said, “Guys that are tough, that love to play football.

“Obviously you’ve got to have the talent and all that, but I’m looking for the intangibles, too. Guys that are going to do things the right way and represent the community the right way.”

Much like Wolford’s first recruiting class in 2010, when he signed Mooney’s Donald D’Alesio and Newton Falls’ Stephen Page among others, Pelini has used his first month on the job to round up a number of Valley athletes who had productive high school careers.

Pelini’s recruiting plan will take some time to get a feel for, but he’ll certainly have an influence on the Valley.