Penn State Spotlight: Intriguing two-team recruiting battles

Today, Rivals national recruiting analyst Ryan O’Bleness cuts through the noise and explores four Northeast recruitments that have essentially become two-team races involving Penn State, even if some prospects have other programs hanging around their lists as window dressing.

The Nittany Lions have several flip targets on the board that they’re still working on. Current South Carolina commit Lex Cyrus remains pledged to the Gamecocks, but there has been a lot of smoke that PSU could be closing in on a flip.

Penn State was originally one of the favorites in Cyrus’ recruitment, as he visited Happy Valley many times, including taking an official visit in late May/early June. But, the high three-star wide receiver eventually committed to South Carolina in July.

However, Penn State never stopped pursuing Cyrus. Sources told Rivals that Penn State head coach James Franklin was at Susquehanna Township High School on Oct. 4 to watch Cyrus in action. The next day, Happy Valley Insider confirmed Cyrus was on campus for PSU’s win versus UCLA on Oct. 5.

Also leading to the speculation that Cyrus could change his mind and head to Penn State is the fact that South Carolina recently gained commitments from 2025 four-star wide receiver Jordon Gidron and four-star wide receiver Malik Clark earlier this month. This is in addition to the two other three-star wide receiver commitments the Gamecocks already have in Brian Rowe and Jayden Sellers.

Despite the apparent momentum to Penn State, though, South Carolina has kept Cyrus pledged and will look to keep it that way.

Another recruitment where there is heavy momentum for Penn State to potentially secure a flip is with current Oregon commit and McDonogh High School (Owings Mills, Md.) standout cornerback Brandon Finney.

The Rivals250 prospect was expected by many fans and pundits to commit to Penn State the first time around, but he chose to pledge to the Ducks on June 25 instead. Prior to his commitment to Oregon, Finney officially visited Penn State during the weekend of May 31 through June 2. He then took his official visit to Eugene in late June and announced his commitment to the Ducks a few days later.

The Nittany Lions continued to stay on him, however. Finney returned to University Park on Oct. 5 to watch Penn State defeat UCLA. One week later, though, Finney was back in Oregon to witness the Ducks take down Ohio State in an exciting overtime game.

Given its resources, Oregon is not going to be easy place to pluck Finney away from, but Franklin and the Penn State coaches remain in constant contact with Finney, and staying closer to home could be appealing to the four-star defensive back.

Finney also took a visit to Michigan on Sept. 7, and it’s possible that the Wolverines could make things interesting. But as of now, it looks like it will come down to Finney either staying firm with head coach Dan Lanning and Oregon or making the switch to Franklin and Penn State.

Out of all the remaining flip targets for Penn State, the current word is that the confidence is highest for the Nittany Lions with high-three-star athlete/linebacker Bradley Gompers out of Pittsburgh Central Catholic.

Gompers is currently committed to Duke and remains solid with the Blue Devils as of now. Outside of posting recent offers from Penn State, Miami (FL.), Michigan, North Carolina State, Ole Miss, Vanderbilt and Virginia over the past month-plus, he has been quiet about his potential plans. With that said, sources have told Rivals that Penn State is a “dream school” for the in-state prospect.

Franklin, without naming any names directly, didn’t mince words recently when hinting toward his interest in Gompers.

“We can’t get enough Pittsburgh Central Catholic guys,” Franklin said.

In the summer, Gompers took official visits to Duke and Michigan State, and he also had one scheduled to Rutgers, but did not end up making it to Piscataway. Gompers returned to Penn State on Oct. 5. to see the Nittany Lions’ 27-11 victory over the Bruins.

It is the strong mix of academics and athletics that drew Gompers to Duke, though, along with his relationships with head coach Manny Diaz and defensive coordinator/linebackers coach Jonathan Patke. Adding an extra layer of intrigue to this battle, Diaz was the defensive coordinator at Penn State in 2022 and 2023. It will be interesting to see what happens here before the Early Signing Period opens in early December.

High four-star defensive end Zahir Mathis has been rumored to be a Penn State flip target for quite some time, but he remains committed to Ohio State and the Buckeyes have a chance to truly lock him in this weekend on his official visit.

While there has been confidence coming out of the Penn State camp about the Nittany Lions’ chances to flip Mathis in the future, the timeline of that potentially happening has been unclear, and the top-50 overall prospect could be the toughest one to secure on this list.

Mathis has been committed to OSU since January, but that has not stopped PSU from recruiting him. The Nittany Lions have hosted the No. 1 player in their home state multiple times, as the Philadelphia product out of Imhotep Institute Charter High School took an official visit in late June. He then returned to Happy Valley in late July for Penn State’s “Lasch Bash” event, and he has taken other unofficial visits there as well.

Playing for head coach Ryan Day and highly regarded associate head coach/defensive line coach Larry Johnson at Ohio State is obviously a huge draw for Mathis, but Penn State also has a strong history of developing defensive linemen. The Buckeyes of course have the leg up here, but expect Franklin, defensive line coach Deion Barnes and the Nittany Lions to continue to pursue heavily.