National Signing Day: USC keeps No. 1 class but it's not over yet

USC will finish National Signing Day with the top-ranked class in the Rivals Industry Team Rankings but No. 2 Notre Dame and No. 3 Oregon are close enough to where the final standings the entire cycle are still to be determined.

If Oregon is able to flip five-star wide receiver Chris Henry Jr. from Ohio State, they would close the gap to a razor thin margin on USC. The ranking would be so close that the final Rivals300, Top247 and ESPN300 released in January would determine who would have the No. 1 class in 2026.

The Santa Ana (Calif.) Mater Dei standout attended the school’s ceremony for all their signees and sat behind a placard with his name and an Ohio State insignia on it.

But moments before Henry arrived at Mater Dei’s event, it was announced that Ohio State offensive coordinator and position coach Brian Hartline would be leaving to take the USF job.

Henry committed to Ohio State more than two years ago and a major reason was because of his relationship with Hartline and so, because of Hartline’s surprise departure on National Signing Day, Henry opted not to sign.

Since he didn’t sign after the Hartline news broke, it’s clear that Ohio State was going to be his pick. Oregon has been working hard to flip Henry basically from the time he picked the Buckeyes and now the Ducks and Texas Longhorns look like the main threat to get him from the Buckeyes. USC is still in the shadows and can never be counted out.

Oregon signed – or is expected to sign – five five-stars on National Signing Day in offensive lineman Immanuel Iheanacho, tight end Kendre Harrison, safety Jett Washington, receiver Jalen Lott and edge rusher Anthony Jones. Washington’s ceremony at Las Vegas Bishop Gorman was planned for 6:30 pm ET and no surprise is expected. Henry would give the Ducks a sixth five-star, by far the highest total yet under coach Dan Lanning.

The Trojans did make noise at Mater Dei on National Signing Day when they flipped four-star receiver Kayden Dixon-Wyatt, who was in line to flip from Ohio State even before the Hartline news broke. Indeed, the program did tremendous work at powerhouse Mater Dei all cycle long, landing Dixon-Wyatt, five-star tight end Mark Bowman and four-star defenders Tomuhini Topui and Shaun Scott.

For USC, the unfortunate narrative in the 2025 recruiting cycle was how many decommitments they endured especially from the Southeast as it still finished with a top-15 class but that ranking would have been far better if everybody stuck.

This cycle was much different and void of that decommitment drama, especially down the stretch. The only prospect to flip late was JUCO defensive back Jakwon Morris and that was mutual after he took a visit to Illinois. USC has had only four decommitments this entire recruiting cycle.

Other than that, the Trojans steered clear of losing top prospects as Texas A&M tried to flip four-star receiver Boobie Feaster with no luck, Oregon tried to flip back Topui and others were being monitored as well but nothing ever materialized on National Signing Day.

The trend especially with so much coaching movement in the last few weeks has been for some other top prospects to also delay signing as Henry is far from alone in that decision as of this writing.

LSU commits Lamar Brown and Deuce Geralds, Syracuse pledge Calvin Russell and some others could delay later into this three-day signing window or beyond.