Three Predictions: Colorado and Michigan, massive upsets, Clemson

Rivals rankings director and transfer portal analyst Adam Friedman has a trio of predictions on Colorado’s and Michigan’s push toward National Signing Day, teams that could stumble this week and Clemson’s future.

National Signing Day is less than a week away. While there are plenty of teams that will add commitments between now and then, Deion Sanders and the Buffs along with Sherrone Moore and the Wolverines look like they’re in for big finishes to the 2025 recruiting cycle.

Top-100 defensive end London Merritt decommitted from Ohio State this weekend and all signs point to him landing at Colorado. The same can be said of Rivals250 offensive lineman Carde Smith.

Merritt’s teammates at IMG Academy Michael Carroll and Nathaniel Owusu-Boateng are strongly considering Colorado as well. Carroll, a five-star offensive lineman, committed to Alabama, and Owusu-Boateng, a five-star linebacker, both took official visits to the Boulder campus. Colorado appears to be pursuing JUCO offensive lineman Nick Csillan as well. The 6-foot-7, 320-pounder added an offer from the Buffs on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Michigan has been the hottest team in the nation since flipping five-star quarterback Bryce Underwood away from LSU. Owusu-Boateng will be choosing between the Wolverines and Colorado. Current Colorado defensive back commit Alex Graham, a Detroit native, appears to be leaning toward staying close to home and signing with Michigan. Momentum looks to be pointing in the right direction for the Wolverines to flip Clemson Rivals250 defensive back commit Jordan Young.

Rivals250 LSU receiver commit Derek Meadows seemed like he was on the verge of following Underwood to Michigan but the Wolverines will need to fight off Alabama to land his commitment. Speaking of Alabama, Michigan has prioritized offensive lineman Ty Haywood, a Crimson Tide commit and top-40 prospect in the Rivals250, but he has not visited the Ann Arbor campus yet.

Michigan is pushing to add some elite defensive ends as well. Five-star Javion Hilson just visited Michigan and the Wolverines are trying to get Auburn commit Jared Smith and Georgia commit Isaiah Gibson on campus. Of these three, Hilson is the most likely to sign with Michigan, considering he’s already visited and his teammate (2026 Rivals250 quarterback Brady Hart) is also committed to Michigan.

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Not that Rivalry Week needed any more juice, there are more than a dozen Power Four games this week with significant College Football Playoff implications and there is sure to be at least one team that steps on a banana peel.

Georgia Tech, Vanderbilt and Syracuse are much better than in years past but are still double-digit underdogs to Georgia, Tennessee and Miami. Reigning national champion Michigan is also a double-digit underdog at Ohio State. Penn State, SMU, Alabama, Indiana and Oregon are all big favorites over Maryland, Cal, Auburn, Purdue and Washington.

Five games are expected to be fairly close: Clemson-South Carolina, USC–Notre Dame, Arizona–Arizona State, Iowa State–Kansas State and Texas A&M–Texas. If I were going to bet on an upset among these significant games, I’d be picking from one of these.

Dabo Swinney has his fair share of invited and uninvited critics thanks to his unconventional recruiting strategy but the Tigers are going to enter the revenue sharing era in position to consistently make College Football Playoff runs. That’s not something I would have really believed until a few days ago.

On Tuesday, news of Clemson’s new NIL and revenue sharing plans came to light which prompted Swinney to say in a press conference “Nobody is going to have more money than Clemson. Nobody, for the first time ever. That’ll be good.” Larry Williams of TigerIllustrated.com has reported that he expects Clemson to allocate “well north of 80-percent” of the estimated $20.5 million revenue sharing pot to the football team.

Call it “changing his stance” or call it “evolving,” Swinney has clearly come around on paying players and that’s a really good thing for the future of Clemson football.

On top of that, Clemson is in a better position than most teams when it comes to getting under the roster limit of 105 players. The Tigers currently have just 14 commitments in their 2025 recruiting class (and could be in danger of losing another commit). There are just seven Power Four programs with fewer than 14 players in their 2025 recruiting class and only one (Florida State) has a higher average stars per commit than Clemson.

Clemson does have 136 players listed on its roster but it still won’t have to “cut” nearly as many players as most of the other Power Four programs. The Tigers are signing a very talented crop of high school prospects to supplement the roster they plan on retaining.

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