Syracuse football recruiting train keeps powering along as NY state champ OL commits

The Syracuse football 2025 recruiting machine keeps on humming, as the Orange picked up another verbal commitment on Monday.

Local product Matthew Hawn, who plays on the offensive and defensive lines for the state champion Christian Brothers Academy in Syracuse, said via his X page that he was verbally pledging to the 'Cuse and its head coach, ace recruiter Fran Brown.

Hawn says on his X page that he is 6-foot-6 and 290 pounds. A huge congrats and welcome from Orange Nation to Matthew!

Hawn's decision gives Syracuse football at least 10 verbal commitments to date in its 2025 class, a cycle that, at the time of this writing, was No. 15 nationally per the industry-generated 247Sports Composite and also inside the 40 overall, according to Rivals.com and the On3 Web site.

What's more, the vast majority of these pledges by high school juniors to the 'Cuse have transpired over the past few weeks. A couple of days ago, the Orange also picked up its first verbal commitment in the 2026 class from four-star athlete/defensive back and top-80 national prospect Demetres Samuel Jr. out of Heritage High School in Palm Bay, Fla.

Syracuse football has scored a pledge from 2025 lineman Matthew Hawn.

On January 22 of this year, Hawn said that he landed a scholarship offer from the 'Cuse coaching staff. Per recruiting services, his offer sheet has also included schools such as UMass, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, Temple, Boston College, Buffalo, Duke, Army, Columbia, Cornell, Fordham and Harvard.

Per his bio on Rivals.com, Hawn has apparently visited Syracuse football three times: On April 6 of 2023, as well as on January 20 and March 5 of 2024.

During the most recent 2023 season, the Christian Brothers Academy sported a 14-0 overall record and claimed the New York state Class AA championship. Hawn said in a post on X that as a junior, he allowed zero sacks and tallied more than 50 pancake blocks, which is impressive.

One of his Christian Brothers Academy teammates will be joining Hawn at the 'Cuse in the future. In mid-March, 2025 three-star wide receiver Darien Williams also verbally committed to Syracuse football.

The 6-foot, 165-pound Williams had secured an Orange scholarship offer on March 5 of this year. Several recruiting services rank him as the No. 1 prospect coming out of New York state within the 2025 cycle.

Of the 10 verbal pledges to Syracuse football so far in this class, four are from New York, two are from Texas, and there is one each from Massachusetts, New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennslyvania.