Oh, Goodbye: Three-Star CB Zachary Gleason Flips To West Virginia

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For the second time this week, Penn State has lost a cornerback in the 2027 class. First, it was Semajay Robinson to UVA. Today, it was Zachary Gleason to West Virginia.

Gleason was the second commit in Penn State’s class post-James Franklin, oddly enough, only being behind Semajay Robinson. Fitting that they both leave the class just a few days apart from each other, though I’m not sure Gleason was as expected as Semajay might have been. Just given that Gleason is a Pittsburgh Central Catholic kid who plays cornerback and was recruited by Terry Smith, you’d think he’d be one of the safer commitments. That, obviously, was not the case.

Good or bad — it depends upon your perspective — this is the recruiting world we live in during the NIL era. I don’t mean this as a slight to Gleason, but a three-star kid is going to be more valuable to West Virginia than it is Penn State. At West Virginia, he’s the 6th highest ranked prospect in their class. At Penn State, he was tied for 15th. With recruiting in a lot of cases just turning into free agency, being slotted higher in a class is going to get you more financial compensation. It’s just like the NFL draft. A 1st round pick is going to make more than a 2nd round pick and so on and so on. So although it stinks to lose a good prospect like Gleason, it’s just the nature of the beast and it’s happening everywhere. Ohio State had 6 decommits last year and here’s where 4 of them flipped to:

Here were a handful of Alabama 10 decommits.

So, yeah, it happens. Where Penn State goes from here will be interesting, as it is down to two corners in the class in four-star Kei’Shjuan Telfair and three-star Ka’ron Ceaser. They do host three-star Texas corner Dhillon McGee for an official visit this weekend so perhaps Terry can work his magic.

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