One of, if not the biggest recruiting goal for Penn State football is to keep the best players in Pennsylvania home.
Overall, coach James Franklin and company have been successful in doing that.
In the past, Saquon Barkley (Whitehall) Micah Parsons (Harrisburg) and Jahan Dotson (Nazareth) have become stars, and current players Nicholas Singleton (Shillington) and Abdul Carter (Philadelphia) are two of Penn State’s top talents.
But Penn State can’t get everybody from Pennsylvania, and Monday evening, one of the state’s top Class of 2025 prospects picked Michigan over PSU.
It was Andrew Olesh, a 6-foot-5, 216-pound TE from Southern Lehigh High School in Center Valley, Pennsylvania.
BREAKING: Four-Star TE Andrew Olesh has Committed to Michigan, he tells me for @on3recruits
The 6’5 215 TE from Center Valley, PA chose the Wolverines over Alabama, Penn State, & Florida State
Ranked as the No. 3 TE in ‘25 (per On3)
“Why not Michigan? Go Blue〽️〽️”… pic.twitter.com/Cnh5rMtTZl
— Hayes Fawcett (@Hayesfawcett3) July 8, 2024
247Sports had Olesh as the No. 2 overall player in Pennsylvania, the No. 5 tight end in the country and the No. 84 overall player.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.Olesh made multiple trips to Beaver Stadium last season, attending Penn State’s games against West Virginia (Sept. 2), Iowa (Sept. 23) and Michigan (Nov. 11). In late January, he visited Happy Valley for one of Penn State’s Junior Day events and came out of the visit with an offer. He then visited one of the team’s spring practices in March and took his official visit the weekend of June 14.
The next weekend, he took an official to Michigan, and that’s who he ended up picking.
This isn’t the first case of a top PA Class of 2025 talent not picking Penn State.
The No. 1 PA player in the class, Spring-Ford QB Matt Zollers, had Penn State as a finalist but committed to Missouri.
OL Michael Carroll, a legacy prospect from Central Bucks East, committed to Alabama and Zahir Mathis, a star from Philly’s famous Imhotep Charter, is committed to Ohio State (although he did take an OV to Penn State the weekend of June 21).
Penn State does have six PA prospects committed to its Class of 2025.
