Skip to main content
miami logo

BREAKING: Miami lands Five-Star Plus+ local DL Armondo Blount, No. 4 overall prospect in 2025 class

Stephen Wagner covers recruiting for the University of Miami for On3 Sports and CaneSport. He can be found on Twitter at @stephenwag22 and reached at Stephen.Wagner@On3.com.by:Stephen Wagner•09/14/23•

stephenwagOn3

texas-extends-three-out-of-state-offers-to-2025-2026-prospects-on-thursday
(Photo by Chad Simmons/On3)

Miami (Fla.) Central 2025 Five-Star Plus+ defensive lineman Armondo Blount, the No. 4 overall prospect in the 2025 class and No. 2 defensive lineman in the On3 Industry Ranking, committed to Miami Thursday night in arguably the biggest recruiting win of head coach Mario Cristobal’s season and a half at Miami, competing with recruiting victories like landing Francis Mauigoa and Samson Okunlola in 2023.

Blount, a 6-foot-3.5, 250-pound three and five technique committed to the Hurricanes over Ohio State, Florida State, Oklahoma and USC, who he recently named in his top five earlier this week.

“1000% committed,” Blount tweeted. “I’m staying home!”

Blount’s commitment comes less than a week after he attended Miami’s 48-33 win over No. 23 Texas A&M, where he was overly impressed with the Hurricanes’ showing. He becomes Miami’s third commit in the 2025 class along with three-star quarterback Luke Nickel and four-star receiver Waden Charles.

Blount is currently the highest-ranked commit Cristobal has landed at Miami (Mauigoa was the No. 12 overall prospect), although there is still well over a year before the final 2025 class rankings are announced.

The No. 1 recruit in the state of Florida has taken six trips to Miami, six trips to Florida, three trips to Florida State and two trips to Alabama. Miami and Florida State had made the two most aggressive, concerted recruiting efforts for the 2025 prospect since Aug. 1, when college coaching staffs became permitted to directly call and text 2025 recruits.

Miami brought Blount down for a last-second visit in late July in the final hours before the August dead period began and have continually impressed Blount and his mother. Cristobal and co-defensive line coaches Jason Taylor and Joe Salave’a were both majorly responsible for the splash commitment and have hammered Blount’s phone daily since the start of August.

“I promise you, I talk to (Miami) every single day, and they say stuff like ‘Good morning,’ ‘How’s your day going?’ ‘How you doing?’ stuff like that,” Blount told CaneSport last week. “Right now, FSU is (pushing the hardest). Every time I go there, there’s a new thing I like about them. Their D-line, the moves they work in practice, you watch them in the game and it all correlates. All the D-linemen are fast, and then when they rotate, they look the same. So they’ve got to be doing something right.”

CaneSport reported last week there was an early recruiting battle between Miami and Florida State for Blount, but the Hurricanes ultimately won out.

“Now that I’m getting to be around them more, it’s the culture they’ve got,” Blount previously told CaneSport. “They’re bringing back Miami kids. Coach Cristobal’s recruiting kids from here, so that’s something I like too, because I want to play with people who are from where I’m from. If Cristobal pulls all of the recruits from South Florida, hey…” he added with a shrug and slight smile.

CaneSport’s Take

There’s a strong argument Blount’s commitment is the biggest recruiting splash Cristobal has made during his time in Coral Gables. Yes, he’s a 2025 prospect, but Blount’s importance to Miami in next year’s cycle was on pace to match No. 1 overall prospect Jeremiah Smith’s importance to the Canes in this year’s cycle.

Miami couldn’t afford to lose out on Blount, who lives less than an hour from campus and has paid attention to the Hurricanes his full life, and landing him should be substantial cause for celebration for Miami’s coaching staff. Make no mistake, keeping elite talents like Blount home is what Cristobal was brought to Coral Gables to do — and with Blount, he did just that.

You may also like