Syracuse Football: Top Ohio RB, who rushed for 1,000-plus yards as a sophomore, to visit

Shahn Alston, who rushed for more than 1,000 yards as a sophomore for his high school program in Ohio, will take a visit to Syracuse football this spring.

In recent days, the 5-foot-10, 205-pound Alston said via his X page that he has lined up nine spring visits to various schools, and he plans to make a trip to the Orange on April 19.

The ‘Cuse annual spring game, by the way, is scheduled for Saturday, April 20. Orange fans are excited about this event, given some of the recent comments made by head coach Fran Brown.

Alston, a running back/multi-positional athlete, appears to be a fast-rising prospect in the 2026 class. He had a standout sophomore year at Thomas W. Harvey High School in Painesville, Ohio.

Syracuse football will welcome talented RB/athlete Shahn Alston on a visit in April.

If you’d like to check out some of Alston’s high school highlights, you can do so by clicking on his bio on the Hudl Web site.

As a sophomore for Harvey during the 2023 season, Alston says that he carried the ball 128 times for 1,041 yards, or 8.1 yards per carry, and scored 17 rushing touchdowns. That’s impressive.

For his performances a stanza ago, he was named to the 2023 Division III All-Ohio third team on offense.

According to 247Sports and On3, when I wrote this column, Alston had to date received six scholarship offers in his early recruiting process. They’re from Akron, Ball State, Eastern Michigan, Miami (Ohio), Toledo and West Virginia.

Additionally, On3 notes that Alston is garnering interest from Ohio State, Clemson, Pittsburgh and Michigan.

Undeniably, his offer list is going to significantly expand, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he gets scholarship offers from many of the college squads that he’s visiting this spring, including the ‘Cuse.

In a recent post that Alston shared on his X page, it looks like within the 2026 cycle, Prep Redzone Ohio rates him as the No. 1 running back and No. 11 overall prospect in that state.

Based on what he did as a sophomore, my assumption is that Alston will soar into the 2026 national rankings published by other recruiting services in the future.

Per recruiting Web sites, the Orange at this juncture has offered scholarships to a handful of running backs in the sophomore class.

Since Brown officially took over the program in early December of last year, he and his newly assembled coaching staff certainly have hit the Northeast corridor hard, particularly New Jersey, the home state of Brown and several other coaches.

At the same time, in their recruiting efforts over several cycles, Orange coaches have proven quite active in other geographic areas, including the states of Ohio and Florida, among others.

Speaking of Ohio, last month, two 2025 four-star prospects from that state included the ‘Cuse among their finalists.

One is running back Kentrell Rinehart, who will spend his senior year at Westland High School in Galloway, Ohio. The 6-foot-1, 205-pound Rinehart recently disclosed a top five of Syracuse football, N.C. State, Minnesota, Indiana and Kentucky.

Rinehart has said he plans to take official visits to all of his finalists. Stay tuned on that.

Additionally, cornerback/athlete Dawayne Galloway Jr. of Marion-Franklin High School in Columbus, Ohio, recently named a top 12 of the Orange, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Colorado, West Virginia, Georgia, Michigan, Purdue, Texas A&M, UCF and Penn State.

Both the 6-foot-1, 175-pound Galloway, a top-100 national prospect in the 2025 cycle, and Rinehart took unofficial visits to the SU campus in late January as part of the Orange’s junior days.