LSU up to No. 6 following 5-star OT Zalance Heard's commitment

Brian Kelly has made a few big splashes so far during his first recruiting cycle as the head coach of LSU. Monroe (La.) Neville five-star offensive tackle Zalance Heard is the latest addition to his impressive rolodex.

Heard announced his commitment Thursday, which moved the 2023 Tigers recruiting class up to No. 6 in the 2023 On3 Consensus Team Recruiting Ranking.

He is also the fourth top-100 recruit in the class after Baton Rouge Catholic wide receiver Shelton Sampson Jr., Miami Gulliver Prep four-star wide receiver Jalen Brown and Baltimore St. Frances Academy four-star EDGE Dashawn Womack.

LSU won the recruitment for the in-state star in part because of how they presented the academics of the school.

“I know for a fact that when we visited LSU, they talked about academics tremendously,” his mother Veronica Faye Heard told On3.. “They honed in academics, on education and what he needed to do in his classes. For Lance, it’s not about the sport. His heart is in it and he loves it, but It was never about the football.” 

Zalance Heard is a major signing for LSU

Zalance Heard is the No. 50 overall recruit in the 2023 cycle, according to the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

However, On3 is the highest on him in the industry, ranking him as a five-star player at No. 13 overall and No. 3 among offensive tavkles

On3 Director of Scouting and Rankings Charles Power said his stature and frame are arguably the best in the class.

“You watch him play, and he’s extremely nasty,” Power said. He plays with a physical edge, works to finish his blocks and just dominates in his first year playing offensive line at the high school level. … I was watching a high school game in Louisiana last year that featured a bunch of top-end talent, and immediately one of the offensive linemen jumped out. And I thought, ‘he’s huge, he’s long and he moves really well.’ And it was him.”

Heard currently has an On3 NIL Valuation of $159k. The On3 NIL Valuation is an index that looks to set the standard market value for both high school and college-level athletes. The NIL valuation does not act as a tracker of the value of NIL deals an athlete has completed to date. It rather signifies an athlete’s value at a certain moment in time.