Penn State football lands two more commits while climbing the 2020 ranks

Penn State football’s 2020 recruiting class continues to climb up the ranks as they add two more prospects to the pool.

We’re only two days into July and roughly about a week into the dead period of the offseason, and Penn State football couldn’t be more successful right now. Last month, it seemed as though the Nittany Lions were growing to be the laughing stock of the Big Ten conference. Now suddenly they are climbing up the recruiting charts on the path to a comeback with their commitments.

I hate to beat a dead horse here as we know the obvious about the recent past. At the beginning of June, Penn State lost four commitments. One to Ohio State, another to the Florida Gators, and most recently, another to Texas A&M. While the fourth and final prospect, Aaryn Parks continues to search for his next destination, he wouldn’t rule out a potential return to Happy Valley. However, nobody at Penn State is going to hold their breath.

For a moment, the losses had many panicked about the state of the 2020 recruiting class, but suddenly everything is shaping up to be a lot better. The Nittany Lions wrapped up the month of June strong, with ten total commitments. Eight of them committed within the last week or so. And now, Penn State gets a solid start to the month of July as they landed two prospects on Tuesday.

Who committed to Happy Valley?

https://twitter.com/cpw_3/status/1146187380707221504

It was a quiet Tuesday night for the Penn State football program. As the staffers are prohibited from hosting or talking to any prospects about potentially joining, the only thing that anybody within the organization could do was hear commitments from players. Well, a three-star wide receiver from Richmond, Texas decided to make a little bit of noise for the program.

On Twitter, Washington posted a video of himself FaceTiming Penn State wide receivers coach, Gerard Parker. That’s the moment when Washington revealed that he intended on coming to Penn State in 2020. The five-foot-ten-inch wideout joins Jaden Dottin and Norval Black as the third wideout to commit to the Nittany Lions’ 2020 class.

Washington wouldn’t be the only commitment on Tuesday as another prospect made his decision to verbally commit to Penn State about an hour after the wideout did. The second commitment of the night happened to be Virginia-based cornerback, Joseph Johnson. The six-foot-two-inch cornerback happens to be a three-star prospect, who ranks 33rd at his position in the nation.

Initially, Johnson was committed to N.C. State, but he decided to open his recruitment back up in May. By then, he had already visited Happy Valley and was made an offer back in March. Johnson visited a handful of schools before returning to Penn State for an official visit in June. After that meeting, it didn’t take much convincing for the cornerback to pick Penn State.

He mentioned in his commitment post on Twitter that Penn State has been a favorite of his from the start, despite having some significant interest from other major schools. With Johnson and Washington’s Tuesday night commitments, the Nittany Lions have climbed back into the top ten for 2020s recruiting cycle, according to 247 Sports. They ranked 3rd in the Big Ten.