It didn’t take long for ASU to reload its roster for upcoming years after Jaden Rashada, Elijhah Badger, and Bryce Pierre entered the transfer portal. Since Friday, the Sun Devils have added four new players to their 2025 recruiting class, which currently ranks 18th in the country and 3rd in the Big-12.
It may have been the most productive recruiting weekend in the Dillingham era.
Who Committed?
Wide receiver Adrian Wilson, safeties Rylon Dillard-Allen and Benjamin Alefaio and linebacker Isaiah Iosefa are the four athletes who have committed since Friday.
Wilson, from Weiss High School in Texas, is the 18th-highest ranked receiver and 155th-highest ranked player in the country, according to 247Sports. His four-star pedigree mirrors Badger’s ranking coming into Tempe.
Dillard-Allen is a three-star Phoenix native who attends Mountain Pointe High School, where he is the No. 4 ranked player from Arizona in his class.
Alefaio, on the other hand, comes from California, ranking as both the 75th-best player in his state and the 75th-best safety in the country.
There have now been three additions to the Devil’s defensive back group over the last two weeks, as Xavier Skowron, the No. 51 safety, announced his arrival to Tempe on April 11.
"How I evaluate our room from a recruiting standpoint, from a roster-building standpoint, is that we have to out-recruit what we had last year," corner backs coach Bryan Carrington said. "We're in a great place right now with our room in comparison to where it was this time last year."
Additionally, 6-foot-7-inch, top 100 offensive tackle recruit Alema Iosua announced on March 30 that he would become a Sun Devil.
Why They’ve Been Successful
In the 2025 recruiting cycle, Dillingham has established three different recruiting pipelines since his arrival.
"Texas to Tempe" encourages Lone Star recruits who aren’t getting many looks from powerhouse programs to consider coming to the Valley. Dillingham added 10 freshmen over his first two recruiting classes in 2023 and 2024. Wilson and Skowron will join that group for 2025.
Another self-proclaimed avenue for incoming Sun Devil recruits has been the "Polynesian Pipeline." Alefaio, Iosefa, and Iosua have all been part of this movement that’s gaining unprecedented traction.
"The Polynesian pipeline is something I am grateful to be a part of," Alefaio said. "The culture of us Polynesians is growing as a whole and is only going up from here on out."
The last avenue, which Dillingham has routinely emphasized as a part of his "Activate the Valley" slogan, is the importance of local recruits. Dillard-Allen highlights this group as the second highest-ranked recruit in ASU’s 2025 class.
"Local guys are starting to say, 'I grew up a fan here, why not?' This is only the beginning," Dillingham said. "We're 18 months into this process. Our first real class was two years behind. If you're not recruiting sophomores, then something’s wrong."
When asked to describe the prowess of the Devil’s 18th nationally ranked 2025 class, ASU’s second-year head coach put it simply: they want guys who want to be here.
"This is not a fallback plan," Dillingham said. "There are people all over the country wanting to be here. This isn’t 'let me go check things out and see if I'll fall back here.'"
Edited by Vinny DeAngelis, Sadie Buggle and Shane Brennan
Reach the reporter at jwkartso@asu.edu and follow @kartsonis3 on X.
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Jack is a sophomore studying sports journalism. This is his second semester with The State Press. He has also worked at other student journalism organizations.
