Following the 2024 Elite 11 Finals, 247Sports released an updated Top247 for college football’s 2025 recruiting class, with a focus on quarterbacks. Among the signal-callers, Alabama-bound Keelon Russell receives a sixth star, while Ohio State commit Tavien St. Clair keeps pressing LSU commitment Bryce Underwood.
It’s time to make a small tweak to the Top247 for the class of 2025 ahead of the crucial senior seasons, now that the summer off-season activities are behind us and high school football games are approaching. While most of the top recruits in the country have been on official visits and committed to colleges for the previous month and a half, June’s Elite 11 Finals provided us with a thorough three-day examination of 20 of the greatest quarterbacks in the cycle. Because of this, the signal-callers were the main focus of this release as queries were addressed.
New assessments from Overtime’s OT7 Finals and newly gathered data from different competitions and camps around the nation are also driving changes in the new Top247.
Something to bear in mind: changes are coming.
After the postseason all-star games in January, we will finalise our 2025 rankings. However, we intend to update the Top247 twice before then, in late September or early October, after everyone has had a few games, and again in December, just before the first signing period.
Bryce Underwood, an LSU commit, has been regarded as the “can’t-miss” quarterback prospect in the class of 2025 for the greater part of the previous year, and with good reason. Underwood, one of the youngest players in the grade, has finished the last three years with a 40-2 record and 141 touchdowns in all. His frame is ideal, and he can go past defences in a number of ways. Our thoughts on Underwood remain unchanged.
However, as we have said in recent months, Tavien St. Clair, an Ohio State recruit, is putting out the word that he too has what it takes. There was a lot of discussion behind the scenes following a “Alpha Dog” performance in the Elite 11 Finals on whether Whether or not to push St. Clair to the top of the rankings, we eventually opted to let the two teams compete in real football over the next months.
Now, it doesn’t mean that St. Clair hasn’t managed to win us over even though he remained at No. 2 and failed to pass Underwood. With his college-ready physique, deft pocket moves, and powerful arm, St. Clair quickly established himself as a player above the others in Los Angeles.
We believe he has what it takes to become a Sunday-morning franchise quarterback when you combine that with the fact that he has improved in significant areas year over year. Naturally, we also feel that same about Underwood.
In the update, St. Clair’s grade rises from a 98 to a 99, matching Underwood at the top of the class. Each has an opportunity to receive a final grade of 100 or above which would place them in exceptional company given that there have only been three other cycles in the 247Sports era in which multiple quarterbacks have been handed three-digit grades: in 2018 (Arch Manning, Nico Iamaleava, and Dante Moore), in 2020 (Bryce Young and DJ Uiagalelei), and in 2023 (Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields).
The nation’s No. 10 overall talent, Alabama quarterback recruit Keelon Russell, who got a fifth star, was one of the greatest risers.
Furthermore, don’t think that simply because he’s now devoted to the Crimson Tide, that’s why he surged up the board. If he had still intended to sign with SMU, we would have taken the same action.
What Russell recorded last autumn was fantastic. In addition, he had a statistically superior junior season compared to all other players in the class, finishing with a Top247-best 72% of his passes completed for 3,483 yards and 38 touchdowns against just three interceptions.
But we were unaware of how he actually compared to some of the other top signal-callers in the class up until the Elite 11 Finals, when you could study him. Russell was named the competition’s MVP when he aced the test, showing off his live arm and rapid release all three days.
We believe Russell is a top-tier playmaker at the position who has the ability to light up scoreboards and push limits. In the Top247, he is also the third-youngest passer.
Dijon Lee, an Alabama commit and cornerback, also received a fifth star. Lee is ranked No. 31 overall, with two quarterbacks falling out of our first-round projection.
At a respectable 6-foot-4, Lee is a near-giraffe in the secondary who has the ability to block out passing windows more than others. In addition, he has demonstrated his ability to reverse direction quickly, having the second-best short shuttle time in the cycle for people taller than 6-foot-3.
Following last year’s Elite 11 Finals, we referred to DJ Lagway as a lottery ticket with an enormous payout. The quarterback who finished as the top pick in the class of 2024 possessed all the necessary skills, but he had not yet demonstrated them on the field. We see Deuce Knight the same way as he approaches his last prep season.
Knight, who is now ranked No. 34 overall, is a 1-of-1 athlete whose explosive testing measures are making him a strong contender for the top spot on our annual Freak’s List. His 42.5-inch vertical jump is the best in the class.
In pads, the lefty has been a streaky passer, but he seems to be coming around. Knight hit key game-changing throws at the Elite 11 Finals and had little trouble attacking the perimeter after winning accurately in the OT7 Finals.
Large, athletic signal-callers are still valued by front offices, as evidenced by recent trends in the NFL Draft. It will be difficult to ignore giving Knight a fifth star if he can perform well and work some magic as a senior.
At No. 38 overall, Matt Zollers, a Missouri commit, is right behind Knight in the rankings. He may eventually become one of the quarterbacks with five-star ranking, along with Underwood, St. Clair, Russell, and Texas A&M commit Husan Longstreet (No. 28 overall). Zollers — similar to Knight is a powerful mover with plenty of arm juice, but he can run hot and cold.
Nine new players in all made it into the Top247. Among them was Bryce Baker, a quarterback commit to North Carolina who opened at No. 160 overall.
In April, Baker made a stir at an Elite 11 regional outside of Atlanta, but it was at the Elite 11 Finals that he truly established himself as one of the class’s most potential signal-callers. Throughout the three days, the dual-threat player remained steady and exhibited exceptional distribution skills while on the run. We are also optimistic about his future after closely examining the 11th-grade footage because there weren’t many passes that were deserving of turnovers.
There was a lot of shuffle among the signal-callers who were previously inside the Top247, even though Baker was the only new quarterback to break into the rankings.
Julian Lewis, a USC commit, and George MacIntyre, a Tennessee commit, both fall into the Day 2 range of the rankings at Nos. 46 and 69, respectively. Lewis is not as physically gifted as the other students in the class, but he is an exceptional processor with pinpoint precision. Despite having a promising build and experience in multiple sports, MacIntyre only managed to win two games in his junior season and had trouble placing the ball on the spring camp circuit.
Both Maryland commit Malik Washington (No. 156) and Georgia commit Ryan Montgomery (No. 111 overall) advanced more than 20 spots. Madden Iamaleava (No. 165), Texas pledge KJ Lacey (No. 179), Mississippi State commit Kamario Taylor (No. 200), Memphis commit Antwann Hill (No. 220), SMU commit Ty Hawkins (No. 225), and Oregon commit Akili Smith Jr. (No. 246) are among the other quarterbacks included in the updated Top247.
In the NFL Draft, 12.7 quarterbacks have been selected annually on average over the last ten years. That’s significant because our rankings process uses the NFL Draft as its compass.
We are attempting to be a little more conservative with that label because we want to stamp signal-callers who are ascending when they enter college, unlike certain recruiting agencies that are a little more permissive with their four-star evaluations for quarterbacks.
As of right now, 19 quarterbacks are regarded by us as four- or five-star prospects heading into their senior seasons, and depending on how things work out, that number could rise to 25 by the end of the season.
