Penn State

Penn State Athletics Adds A Men’s Hockey, Three Football Commitments In Matter Of Hours

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Paul Bowman
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Paul Bowman Sports Editor

Penn State Great Valley MBA, Penn State Berks Undergrad, Eagle Scout and Vigil Honor, IT Service Manager. I joined Sports Talk Philly in 2017 and root for all the Philly teams (as well as their minor league counter parts).

All posts by Paul Bowman
Sports Editor

Published04 Jun 2023

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Penn State Athletics Adds A Men's Hockey, Three Football Commitments In Matter Of Hours
Image via Dejuan Lane’s Twitter

In a matter of just a few hours, Penn State athletics added several top talents to their recruiting classes.

The day opened with Men’s Ice Hockey, who just missed out on making the Frozen Four a few months ago, landing an NHL prospect for their future.

Reese Laubach, a center who was selected in the seventh round by San Jose in the 2022 NHL Draft, will look to take his next step by heading to State College.

Laubach is a California native who spent the last two season in the USHL.

He will join forwards Aiden Fink and Jacques Bouquot as player who will join the Lions in the upcoming season.

Meanwhile, football had the first of their official onsite visits during this latest recruiting period and James Franklin and his staff wasted no time locking down three commitments all within a few hours of each other.

Around noon and around the same time the Hockey team landed their own commitment, the football staff secured their first commitment of the weekend.

It was yet another offensive lineman, this time tackle Deryc Plazz.

Incredibly, Plazz becomes the sixth offensive linemen to join the Nittany Lions 2024 class and all are three-star prospects or higher.

This is in addition to the four scholarship offensive linemen and a PWO OL that will join them this upcoming season as part of the 2023 class.

Plazz is currently playing high school ball in Florida.

A short while later, Maryland defensive lineman Xavier Gilliam announced his commitment to the program.

Currently listed as an EDGE, Gilliam becomes the first commit in the Nittany Lions’ 2024 recruiting class.

The staff wrapped up the night by adding a third commitment to their board in the form of four-star safety Dejuan Lane.

Lane is a top-10 prospect coming out of Maryland and represents Penn State’s fourth commitment in the secondary for the 2024 recruiting class.

The three newest additions move the 2024 class for the Nittany Lions up to 17 recruits.

They also move the recruiting class to the sixth-best nationally and the third-best in conference. Those rankings could figure to go up with the success that the football program has had recruiting three-star players they’ve identified as breakout candidates early who push up the prospect rankings after their commitment to the program.

The Nittany Lions are not done yet and will continue to look to add talent for their next recruiting class, as well as the 2025 class should opportunities to do so present themselves.