Penn State Has Successful Early Signing Day

Tagged under: News, Penn State, Pennsylvania Colleges, pfn, Recruiting

Mason Eddinger | December 4, 2024

Across the Nation, recruits are putting pen to paper and officially signing to their schools. It was a successful early signing day for Penn State as they locked in all 26 of their commitments today. This puts the Nittany Lions 18th in the country in recruiting rankings.

18th is a respectable mark, but not nearly where the Nittany Lions want to be. Name Image and Likeness (NIL) has played a big part in the ranking. Penn State’s director of player personnel Andy Frank says that the PSU NIL situation has gotten better but still is not where it needs to be.  Frank said, “If (money) is the only thing kids and families are looking at, we’re probably not the place for them.” If the 18th placemark holds, it would be Penn State’s lowest ranking since 2021. They hold the 8th-highest ranking out of the 12 teams currently in the College Football Playoff.

The saying “The best in PA stay in PA” has been synonymous with the Penn State program for years now. Every year, the top players in PA would all flock to Penn State, that was not the case this year. Out of the top 10 PA prospects, Penn State just signed 3. Last year, they signed 5 of the top 10.

The highest-ranked recruit from PA who committed to Penn State was Cameron Smith, a LB out of St. Joe’s Prep. Smith will play for yet another class 6A State Championship on Saturday night against the Central Catholic Vikings. In that game, he will be playing against a soon-to-be teammate Xxavier Thomas a 4-star corner from Central Catholic. Smith will have to beef up a little as he is just 200 pounds, but he should be dangerous when he does. Penn State gets another great addition to one of the best LB schools in the country.

Another high-profile recruit is Aliquippa RB Tikey Hayes. When watching him play, I can’t help but draw comparisons to Jahmyr Gibbs of the Detroit Lions. Like Gibbs, Hayes is as quick and elusive as they come. He will play in a stacked backfield in his first few years, but don’t be surprised if Penn State utilizes the speedy 3-star early on in his career. Alongside Hayes in the RB room is Jabree Wallace-Coleman, another 3-star RB. Wallace-Coleman hails from Imhotep Charter, another perennial PA power. He is 20 pounds bigger and 2 inches taller than Hayes and will be used in different ways.

Amongst the non-PA recruits is LaVar Arrington Jr., who goes back to his father’s alma mater. Their top-rated recruit, Malachi Goodman, an interior linemen from New Jersey has D-1 size at 6’5″ and 315 pounds.

Overall, this is a solid class for Penn State, supplying themselves for the future in a bunch of different positons. The easy part is over for the Nittany Lions, now they move to flipping some previously committed players to further strengthen their class.

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