This past week was huge for Syracuse football. They picked up another ACC road victory over a “rival” and finished a regular season in football with 9 wins. But there was more to be happy about this week than just potentially avoiding a Pinstripe Bowl. It was also a huge week on the recruiting trail. Let’s discuss who the Orange got.
Mikel Jones
This dude is a flat-out stud. It’s fair to say Jones is the biggest recruit, not named Tommy DeVito, SU has gotten in the past five years. He’s an ESPN 300 guy and four star on every recruiting site you can find. 247sports.com gives Jones an 89 overall grade. To put it in perspective, only two other Syracuse commits have gotten a grade that high since 2010 and no one higher. Tommy DeVito and Trill Williams are the two.
On ESPN, Jones checks in as the 296th best player in his class. His overall grade of 80 ties him with Ed Hendrik for the highest rated player in the past two classes now for Syracuse, according to the WorldWide Leader. If his rating doesn’t tell you enough, just look at some of the schools he turned down: Georgia, Clemson, Auburn, West Virginia and NC State. He’s also another IMG Academy guy, which is quickly becoming the Brewster Academy of Syracuse football at this point.
Lee Kpogba
Apparently one four-star linebacker in a week wasn’t enough for Dino. Kpogba, who is a four-star according to 247sports, also committed after visiting for the Louisville shellacking last week. Rivals.com ranks him as the 6th best outside linebacker in the country. At 6’2, 210, he is two inches taller than Jones and the same weight.
To make this even sweeter, Kpogba hails from the heart of ACC country in Winston Salem. He had offers from Florida State, Duke and Tennessee and recently turned down West Virginia at the altar by decommitting back on October 9th. Linebacker was a position of need going into this class. That was clearly a main objective and with Kpogba and Jones, SU might have their Paris Bennett and Zaire Franklin’s of the future.
Cornelius Nunn
Some might recognize this name because he was once committed to Syracuse. But after the Pittsburgh loss, Nunn abruptly decommitted and then declared he had intentions to play for his hometown Hurricanes of Miami. Well, looks like he realized which program has a brighter future after all. Nunn, a three-star safety, recommitted to the Orange this past week. With a grade a tick below 88 on 247sports.com, he is now the third highest rated commit in the 2019 class behind Jones and Kpogba.
Class Overview
It’s still early and Syracuse still hasn’t pulled in a special class by any means. 247sports currently has them as the 12th best in the ACC and 61st in the country, which are lower marks than the 2018 cycle. But, it’s pretty clear the class is trending up in correlation with SU’s play on the field and last week was one of the biggest Syracuse football recruiting weeks in a long, long time.
