Syracuse football recruiting: 4-star RB Mychale Salahuddin includes Orange in top 4

With the early signing period over with, and the holidays coming up right after, things have been pretty quiet on the Syracuse Orange football recruiting front. Until Thursday afternoon, that is.

Pittsburgh Sports Now reported that four-star 2018 running back Mychale Salahuddin has narrowed his list four schools — including North Carolina, Pitt, USC and Syracuse. The story also revealed that Salahuddin will be making his official visit to SU on January 19.

Salahuddin was a long-time USC pledge, before decommitting just a few days before the early signing period. A week before that, Orange head coach Dino Babers was joined by assistant Reno Ferri for an in-home visit with Salahuddin. The Washington D.C. back had set a top five list of Clemson, Maryland, North Carolina, Pitt and USC shortly after that. But as we should know by now, none of these things are official until the player signs on the dotted line.

Over on the 247Sports composite, Salahuddin is currently ranked as D.C.’s top prospect, and the fourth-best running back in the class. He’s a top-200ish player overall, sitting at No. 207.

If the 5-foot-10, 193-pound rusher committed to Syracuse, he’d be the highest-rated Orange player for 2018, according to the composite rankings. He’d be the fourth player to receive some sort of four-star evaluation, however, joining Qadir White, Edward Hendrix and Atrilleon Williams.

Salahuddin is actually teammates with Hendrix at H.D. Woodson, and as Stephen Bailey points out, he’s also a former teammate of Orange linebacker commit Juan Wallace.

This would be a huge addition for Syracuse as National Signing Day approaches. The Orange signed 15 players during the early signing period, and have seven more scholarships to give out. Three players — Jawhar Jordan, Ja’Quirius Smith and Akeem Dixon -- are currently verbally committed but unsigned. Jordan and Dixon are both running backs, and Jordan has at least provided a strong indication he’ll sign on National Signing Day.