Miami football recruiting: 5-star DL Armondo Blount flips back to Hurricanes

Armondo Blount has flipped again. The five-star defensive lineman from Miami signed with the hometown Hurricanes at a ceremony at Central High School on Wednesday night. Here is what you need to know:

• Blount is ranked No. 22 overall and the No. 4 defensive lineman in the 247Sports Composite.
• He originally committed to Miami as a Class of 2025 prospect in September. He reclassified to the 2024 class in October and flipped his commitment to Florida State.
• He is the second five-star prospect in Miami’s class.

Big win for the Canes

Not only is this a huge win over their rival and the defending ACC champions on the trail, but this helps solidify Miami’s defensive line haul as the best in the country this cycle. That’s a goal Mario Cristobal set out to meet this summer when he hosted close to a dozen of the top defensive linemen.

With Blount, fellow five-star Justin Scott and four-star Marquise Lightfoot, Miami is the only team to sign three defensive linemen who rank among the top 100 recruits in the cycle. In 2023, Georgia and Alabama were the only programs to sign three or more top-100 defensive linemen. — Manny Navarro, college football staff writer

Tough loss for the Noles

This one stings. The Seminoles enjoyed a big victory over Miami in October when it swiped one of the best players in South Florida away from Cristobal. Mike Norvell still has an elite recruiting class — FSU’s first to finish in the top 10 since 2017. But it’s missing a game-changing pass rusher like Blount. Four-star DD Holmes and three-star Jamorie Flagg are solid additions and will help provide depth in 2024. But Blount could have easily moved into a rotational spot right away.

The good news is former five-star recruit and Georgia signee Marvin Jones Jr., an FSU legacy and transfer commitment, helps fill the gap vacated by Blount. But it would have been nice for the Seminoles to have both players. — Navarro

FSU vs. Miami for an elite-level prospect

Both Miami and Florida State are programs that cannot be left out of the discussion when telling the story of college football in the last 50 years. And though the Seminoles had a resurgence this season — culminated by a terrible break in the College Football Playoff committee boardroom — both of these programs are fighting to return to the dominance they enjoyed in the 1980s and ’90s. Big-time battles for in-state prospects like Blount are fun recruiting stories that could shape the future of this rivalry and determine which one of these programs gets back to being elite.

Florida State has a head start in that department, but Miami’s recruiting surge since flipping Scott from Ohio State in late November gives us more to like about the Hurricanes’ build. Both Florida State and Miami are in the top six of the recruiting rankings — where they belong. — Ari Wasserman, college football senior writer

Required reading

(Photo: Manny Navarro / The Athletic)