Penn State football announces first member of Class of 2025; who is it?
Penn State football is spending the early portion of Wednesday celebrating the Class of 2025. Head coach James Franklin and his staff are overseeing National Signing Day festivities at the Lasch Building in State College as the No. 3 Nittany Lions continue to prepare for Saturday’s clash with No. 1 Oregon in the Big Ten title game.
As is always the case, Franklin sits at the head of a table inside the program’s main building and is set to video chat with every signee. The program is expecting minimal drama today or at least hoping that will be the case. The first signee became official at 7:15 a.m. Who was it?
The answer: Powhatan, Va., four-star tight end Matt Henderson. The 6-foot-5, 208-pound prospect has been committed to the Nittany Lions since May 8, 2024.
“You guys have been phenomenal, high production, low maintain, great student; we can’t wait to get you to campus,” Franklin said.
Added tight ends coach Ty Howle:
“It’s been a long journey, man. Got a lot of hard work ahead of us, but I can’t wait to get started.”
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Henderson is the No. 320 player in the On3 Industry Rankings and the No. 18 tight end. On3 has him inside the top-250 at No. 247 overall. It ranks him as the No. 15 tight end.
More recruits will be welcomed throughout the morning. Follow along live with Blue-White Illustrated as recruiting insider Ryan Snyder offers live updates all morning long.
Penn State mixing recruiting and game prep
Laughing that the current recruiting calendar doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, Franklin explained how his staff is handling this momentous day for the incoming Penn State freshmen class while prepping for the Ducks.
“The good thing is we got, we got a pretty good staff in terms of recruiting staff and off the field people, so right now it’s just myself and the recruiting staff handling all this,” Franklin said. “The coaches are working on the game plan and getting ready for practice. Created, obviously, some late nights for us as well. But the coaches, all the assistants, you won’t see them as much this year [on Signing Day] as you normally have.”
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