Syracuse Football: National analyst dishes on top suitors for ‘Cuse 5-star targets

In recent weeks, Syracuse football coaches have turned up the heat with their 2025 recruiting efforts.

Orange coaches have held a couple of junior days, hosting various 2025 targets on the Hill for unofficial visits. The ‘Cuse has also made list cuts of numerous highly ranked juniors, while also doling out scholarship offers to some of the top prospects in this cycle.

Regarding the latter, two 2025 five-star players who have relatively new offers from the Orange coaching staff are offensive tackle David Sanders Jr. and safety Faheem Delane.

In late January, the ‘Cuse offered the 6-foot-7, 265-pound Sanders out of the Providence Day School in Charlotte, N.C.

In mid-December of last year, the Orange offered the 6-foot-2, 193-pound Delane, who is a standout at Good Counsel High School in Olney, Md.

On December 20, 2023, MaxPreps unveiled its junior All-America teams for the 2023 season. Both Sanders and Delane were placed on the first squad.

Syracuse football may prove a long shot for a pair of 2025 five-star prospects.

Sanders and Delane are elite juniors. Delane, rated in the top 20 nationally, is deemed the country’s No. 1 safety in this cycle by some recruiting services.

Sanders, meanwhile, is a consensus top-five overall player in the 2025 class and the nation’s No. 1 offensive tackle. Rivals.com, when I wrote this piece, had him as the No. 1 national prospect in the junior cycle.

In a recent story, Rivals.com national analyst Adam Friedman discussed numerous top-flight players in the 2025 and 2026 classes, including Sanders and Delane.

My sense is that, after reading Friedman’s article, the Orange doesn’t appear to be a big contender for either of these 2025 targets, but at the same time, I would never count out Syracuse football head coach Fran Brown and his staff.

Regarding Sanders, the Rivals.com national analyst noted that he recently visited Clemson. Friedman added here, “Georgia has been viewed as the team to beat for Sanders but Clemson is a major contender along with Tennessee, Ohio State and a few others.”

As it pertains to Delane, he recently traveled to Oregon for a visit. I read multiple media reports stating that his trip to the Ducks went quite well.

Friedman wrote: “Oregon will get Delane back for an official visit and it’s probably fair to say the Ducks are one of the top two or three contenders for Delane coming off this visit. … Delane is looking at a commitment sometime in June after his official visits. Ohio State, Virginia Tech, and Texas should also be getting official visits from Delane with Maryland, LSU and Alabama as other possibilities.”

On January 27, Syracuse football coaches landed their first verbal commitment in the 2025 class, as four-star edge and a top-300 national prospect Sharlandiin Strange picked the ‘Cuse over Penn State, Pittsburgh, Rutgers and Southern California.

The 6-foot-4, 245-pound Strange stars for Cheltenham High School in Wyncote, Pa.