Syracuse football makes final 6 of 4-star offensive tackle, top-75 national prospect

Consensus four-star junior Jaelyne Matthews from New Jersey, who will take an official visit to Syracuse football in the coming months, has named his half-dozen finalists. The Orange made the cut.

The 6-foot-8, 330-pound Matthews said via his X page that his top 6 features the ‘Cuse, Georgia, Maryland, Miami, Rutgers and Tennessee.

Naturally, this is highly encouraging news for the Orange’s chances to prevail for this elite offensive tackle in the 2025 class, although the competition is steep.

For what it’s worth, when I wrote this article on Tuesday, Georgia had some analyst buzz in Matthews’ recruitment across the 247Sports Web site, Rivals.com and the On3 Web site.

Syracuse football remains in the hunt for 2025 four-star OT Jaelyne Matthews.

It should be noted that Syracuse football head coach and ace recruiter Fran Brown, most recently, served as the defensive backs coach at Georgia.

Matthews was initially offered a scholarship by the Orange coaching staff, under former head coach Dino Babers, in April of 2022.

However, around the time that Brown officially took over the ‘Cuse program in early December of last year, Matthews said on X that the Orange “is now part of my top schools.”

Matthews, who has collected more than two dozen scholarship offers from a range of high-major programs throughout his recruiting process, is a standout at Toms River High School North in Toms River, N.J.

Multiple Syracuse football coaches, including Brown, also hail from the Garden State. The new Orange staff, in recent months, has recruited New Jersey hard, along with the rest of the Northeast corridor.

Not too long ago, Matthews said that he would take an official visit to the Hill May 31 to June 2. According to recruiting services, he also has official visits planned for June to both Georgia and Tennessee, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he ends up making trips to all of his finalists.

Matthews was verbally committed to Big Ten Conference member Penn State. But in mid-September of 2023, he de-committed from the Nittany Lions and reopened his recruitment.

Within the junior cycle, Matthews is a top-flight prospect. On3 recently refreshed its 2025 rankings, and he checked in there at No. 75 overall, No. 10 at offensive tackle and No. 3 in New Jersey.

At the time of this writing, the industry-generated 247Sports Composite placed him at No. 90 nationally, No. 10 at offensive tackle and No. 2 in New Jersey.

Over at the industry-generated On3 Industry Ranking, Matthews was No. 150 nationwide, No. 12 at offensive tackle and No. 4 in New Jersey.

In recent weeks, Syracuse football has made final list cuts for numerous highly ranked players in the junior cycle.

To date, the Orange has one verbal pledge in the 2025 class. In late January of this year, four-star edge and top-300 national prospect Sharlandiin Strange of Cheltenham High School in Wyncote, Pa., verbally committed to the ‘Cuse over other finalists Penn State, Pittsburgh, Rutgers and Southern California.