Elite 2025 EDGE Jared Smith to visit USC this weekend

After visiting South Carolina, a trip to Gainesville to visit Florida this weekend was next on the docket for Hoover (Ala.) Thompson four-star EDGE Jared Smith. Those plans have changed.

Smith will instead head west in the coming days to visit USC, he tells On3’s Chad Simmons. It will be his first trip to see Lincoln Riley and the Trojans.

It’s been an SEC-heavy push for the 6-foot-6, 230-pounder thus far. He’s taken trips to the likes of Georgia, Alabama, Auburn, South Carolina, Ole Miss and more, but it’ll be a program on the other side of the country that gets a chance to make an impression this weekend.

Smith is the No. 48 overall prospect and No. 5 EDGE in the 2025 cycle, according to the On3 Industry Ranking, a weighted average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies. He’s also the No. 4 player in Alabama.

USC seeking top-notch 2025 recruiting class

The Trojans currently have just one commitment in their 2025 class — but it’s a big one. Carrollton (Ga.) five-star quarterback Julian Lewis has reclassified from the 2026 cycle — and while he’s still taking plenty of visits and working through his recruitment, he remains committed to USC.

Riley and his staff are working to land a slew of the top prospects in the cycle, however. The likes of Overland Park (Kan.) Blue Valley Northwest four-star offensive tackle Andrew Babalola, McKinney (Texas) four-star linebacker Riley Pettijohn and Dallas Skyline four-star LB Elijah Barnes have all been visited by Riley over the past week.

Add Smith to the list of top targets for the soon-to-be Big Ten program.

“This starts a big time for me. I get to see more about the coaches now and I will have a whole different perspective on things,” Smith told Simmons back in August. “Last year I was just going to games, but now I am getting to know coaches, I know how they coach and I have learned a lot about the different schools and the different schools to give me an idea of what I am looking for going into this fall.”

Smith has an On3 NIL Valuation of $78K. The On3 NIL Valuation is the industry’s leading index that sets high school and college athletes’ projected annual value (PAV). The NIL valuation does not act as a tracker of the value of NIL deals an athlete has completed to date. It rather signifies an athlete’s value at a certain moment in time.