2025 Penn State football commit schedules official visit with Big Ten foe

The Penn State football team currently has a top-20 2025 recruiting class in the country. With a slate of impressive prospects to step on campus over the next few months, the Nittany Lions are hopeful to increase that ranking. But the first challenge will be keeping the current commits satisfied with their decision. As linebacker and current Penn State commit DJ McClary will take an official visit to Rutgers at the end of May.

Penn State football commit schedules official visit with Big Ten foe

DJ McClary made his pledge to the Penn State football team official on September 24th, 2023. His commitment holds significant merit among the top recruiting analysts. On3 ranks the Jersey City, NJ native as the No. 6 prospect in the state and the No. 14 linebacker in the 2025 recruiting class, both Rutgers and Boston College pursued McClary during his recruiting process.

While he made his commitment official it appears that Rutgers continues to push for the in-state prospect. According to his recruiting profile on Rivals, McClary is set to make an official visit to the Scarlet Knights on May 31st. This will be interesting to see if and how this impacts his pledge to the Nittany Lions.

James Franklin addressed a similar scenario last fall

At the end of the 2023 season, a report broke that insinuated that 2025 QB commit Bekkem Kritza was aware of former Nittany Lion OC Mike Yurcich being let go before it happened. Kritza met with the coaches ahead of the Michigan game last season and Yurcich was not in the room.

James Franklin cleared up the decision-making process to the media last November and how important it is for recruits to be sure of the decision they are making.

“I think you guys know me well enough to know that’s not the case,” Franklin said. “I can’t talk specifics about recruits, as you guys know, but I think you guys know me well enough.”

“Every recruit that I have ever met with, I talk to the recruit about committing to Penn State and committing to me, because of the nature of college football,” he continued. “I don’t want there to be a coaching change, or a coach leaves to go be the head coach at Virginia Tech or Old Dominion or Mississippi State, and now all of a sudden, you’re unsure. So, I cover that with every single recruit, but I also can see that based on the timing of how things played out that, for a young kid, him kind of connecting the dots in the wrong way.”

While 2025 recruiting class commit DJ McClary has not decommitted from Penn State, it’s clear that James Franklin goes through a thorough process when a player commits that they are sure of the decision.