Bloomington – Indian football got three verbal commitments for his 2025 Ohio State signing class during a 36-hour period
It all started with Winton Woods’ defense Seaonta Stewart picking the Hoosiers on Monday afternoon.
Princeton Linebacker Paul Nelson and offensive lineman Findlay Baylor Wilkin followed suit on Tuesday. They announced their commitments within minutes of each other to give UI 21 verbal commitments in class.
Stewart, who also took official visits to West Virginia and Purdue, was the highest-rated player of the group. The 6-foot-4, 180-pound defenseman is the fourth member of the class ranked among the top 750 players in the country (No. 686) according to the 247-Sports Composite Rankings.
According to 247 Sports, the three-star recruit had 19 scholarship offers, including those from Oklahoma, Kentucky, Illinois, Michigan State, Penn State, Pittsburgh and Tennessee.
The IU team’s trend of focusing on boosting the team’s secondary continues. While Stewart has positional flexibility — he’s listed on recruiting services as an athlete — he’s the fifth-ranked defensive back in the class.
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Nelson had verbally committed to Cincinnati in June, but that decision came before his official visit to Bloomington. The defender attended Princeton High School, located less than 20 miles from the Bearcats’ campus in downtown Cincinnati.
The three-star defensive back had 16 scholarship offers, including those from Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan and Michigan State. He was the No. 1,140-ranked recruit nationally and the No. 113-ranked linebacker in the 2025 class.
Wilkin was a three-star interior offensive lineman with a scholarship offer list that got much longer in June. The Hoosiers offered him along with Cincinnati, Miami (OH), Western Kentucky and Navy over a 10-day period.
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All three players fall into the region that new Indiana coach Curt Cignetti defined when he took over. The Hoosiers have as many verbal commitments from Ohio (four) as they have in-state prospects.
“I think the plan for most teams across the country is pretty much the same,” Cignetti said in December. “You have to do a great job in your state and the border states within a 4.5-hour and 5-hour radius.”
Indiana has 12 commitments within a five-hour drive of Bloomington that include two recruits from Tennessee, two from Illinois and one from Missouri, but the new staff has promised to venture out as much as necessary to land the right mix of talent.
“Wherever they are, we will find them,” Cignetti said. “If we think they are a good fit and match, then we will place them on campus.”
Michael Niziolek is the Indiana reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek and read all of its coverage clicking here.
This article originally appeared in The Herald-Times: Indiana football: New team racking up recruiting wins in Ohio
