Early National Signing Day came and went with a lot of excitement, but not a whole lot of drama. If you've been following along here at DeathValleyInsider.com, you'd know we fully expected the Mike Tyler, Derek Meadows and Solomon Thomas flips to take place today and expected everyone else to sign.
LSU came into today with 24 commits, and left with 23 signees. Derek Meadows and Devin Harper left and Solomon Thomas joined the Tigers 2025 class. Overall, it was a pretty successful day for Brian Kelly and Co., who have gone through their fair share of losses this cycle.
In case you missed it, here's a recap of what went down on Wednesday:
The Headliners
DJ Pickett's camp was pretty quiet throughout his recruiting process, which caused some concern with LSU fans, especially after the five-star deleted his commitment post on Instagram. Despite a strong push from Miami and Florida, the five-star DB stayed strong in his commitment and signed with the Tigers.
Harlem Berry's recruitment was about as easy as it gets when it comes to a five-star. The Metairie, La. native committed to LSU in January and never wavered. Teams were working to flip him up until the last moment, but nobody could sway Berry away from LSU.
The Flips
For the first time in a while, LSU found themselves on the right side of a major flip. Former FSU commit, Solomon Thomas, has been on flip watch for a while, and on the eve of National Signing Day, it looked like LSU were the favorites with Florida following. On Wednesday morning though, it seemed like LSU had all the momentum, and that evening, Brad Davis got his guy to replace Devin Harper, who flipped to Ole Miss a few weeks back.
Somewhat surprisingly, the only LSU commit who flipped on Early National Signing Day was three-star TE, Mike Tyler. This was one that we saw coming from a mile away. The Columbia, SC. native was always linked to Shane Beamer's squad. It was really a matter of "when" not "if" he was going to flip.
We saw this one coming ever since Bryce Underwood flipped to Michigan. At first he was rumored to go to Ann Arbor with him, but since then, the Tide became the favorites for his talents and got the job done on signing day.
The Wiff
LSU had the No. 8 player in the country sitting in their backyard and couldn't get him to stay home. Jahkeem Stewart, the No. 1 SDE in the country, reclassified to 2025 not too long ago, and despite some help from Frank Wilson, Stewart committed to USC. Reports came in that Stewart accepted a two million dollar NIL deal with the Trojans. LSU backed out once the price tag his 1.25 million.
The 2025 Early Signees
For most of LSU's 2025 signing class, there wasn't too much drama. A lot of their commits had already shut their recruitment down and always intended to sign with the Tigers.
Brian Kelly said he expects the 2025 class to be at least 25 players, so there will likely be more commitments to come in the next couple days or in the later signing period in February.
Here are all of LSU's 2025 early signees as of Wednesday night:
LSU had the No. 8 player in the country sitting in their backyard and couldn't get him to stay home. Jahkeem Stewart, the No. 1 SDE in the country, reclassified to 2025 not too long ago, and despite some help from Frank Wilson, Stewart committed to USC. LSU made his final four list, but there was never much confidence from the Tigers in this one.