Penn State topped off an already-great class on National Signing Day 2018. The Nittany Lions finished with the nation’s No. 5 class, second-best in the Big Ten after No. 2 Ohio State.
Penn State’s 2018 signing class finalizes the Lions’ return to blue-blood status
The Nittany Lions have emerged as the most serious Big Ten East challenger to Ohio State.
Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
The Nittany Lions have been slowly building to a haul like this for years.
They signed the No. 20 class in 2016 and No. 15 in 2017. Now, they’ve broken through on the heels of a second straight New Year’s Six bowl bid, assembling their best class in more than a decade. Penn State’s here to stay.
Penn State accumulated enough talent that losing a commitment from Justin Fields, the No. 1 dual-threat quarterback prospect in the country, registers more as a blip than a serious problem.
Penn State’s group includes three five-stars who signed during the new Early Signing Period in December: defensive end Micah Parsons, receiver Justin Shorter, and running back Ricky Slade. Parsons might be the best speed-rushing end in the class. Shorter is ranked the No. 1 receiver on the Composite, a dizzying blend of route running, speed, hands, and size. Slade is a classic speed back with a bit of power to his game, elusive enough to be good as a true freshman. The offensive line haul that’ll block for Slade and make time for Shorter’s QB is great, too. It has two elite tackles in Nana Asiedu and Signing Day commitment Rasheed Walker, who liked the Lions enough to pick them over Ohio State.
The class is heavier on defense than offense, which is quite a thing to say about a class that has two five-star skill players. The Lions added a couple other blue-chip defensive linemen to go with Parsons, including gap-plugging tackle P.J. Mustipher. Another end, Jayson Oweh, would get more attention in a class that didn’t also have Parsons. The class includes a couple of blue-chip inside linebackers from Pennsylvania, Jesse Luketa and Nick Tarburton.
The class is lightest in the secondary, but PSU has lots of returning talent there.
Penn State, at the moment, is only looking up at Ohio State in the Big Ten.
Ohio State is one of the top two recruiting programs in the country and remains the class of the Big Ten, both on the field and on the trail. But Penn State was significantly better than Michigan last year and only put more distance between itself and UM with this signing class. Michigan’s class was smaller than the last few years, which is just a function of scholarship math. But Penn State’s still moving forward more quickly.
One of those three schools — OSU, PSU, Michigan — should win the Big Ten East and then the Big Ten Championship every year. They’re more talented than the rest of the East and anybody in the West, including perpetually overachieving Wisconsin.
The Nittany Lions have put down a down payment on a house in the 10-win neighborhood. As long as you’re in that zip code, you’ve got a shot.
In this era, Penn State has never recruited as well as now.
Most of Penn State’s history as a dominant program was before recruiting rankings became a thing around the early 2000s. It might not be quite right to say Penn State’s never recruited this well, because Joe Paterno’s staffs spent years landing the best players on the East Coast and throughout Pennsylvania. But the Lions didn’t recruit all that well for much of the 2000s and early 2010s.
Franklin is now building talent at a better rate than Penn State has for as long as they’ve been measuring these things. He’s getting players at a championship clip.
