Lucky Charms: Latest on 2025 WR Derek Meadows as of Thursday night

Here are today’s Lucky Charms, a Monday-Thursday insider notes article on Notre Dame football recruiting.

What a whirlwind this recruitment has been. To start, these are the battles you want to be in if you’re Notre Dame. We’ll see if it’s Alabama, LSU or Notre Dame for Las Vegas Bishop Gorman’s Derek Meadows when he announces his pledge Saturday at 3 p.m. ET, but from everything I’m hearing behind the scenes, the Irish staff has given their all on this one. They’re working the right angles here, but it might not be enough. LSU seemingly came out of nowhere in this recruitment, going from an afterthought to being considered the leader early this week.

In talking to sources connected to the recruitment the past few days, it’s really been all over the place regarding Notre Dame’s optimism that they’d land Meadows. Early in the week, the talk was all about Alabama. Then it shifted to LSU when news broke of his commitment date. Then Notre Dame shoved all its chips to the center of the table Tuesday night, and Blue & Gold was told that it was a “game-changer.” My read on that was Meadows was a near lock to LSU until the Irish made their push. It’s been more quiet on the Meadows front for the past 24-36 hours with the family going into final decision mode. I expect them to come to a final decision either tonight or early Friday.

The vibe is that Notre Dame is not overly optimistic right now; that was the vibe in talking with sources Thursday evening. If I were a betting man, I would go with LSU. But there’s no telling what the Meadows’ camp will end up deciding. It feels like Alabama is fading, for what it’s worth.

I’m definitely not ruling Notre Dame landing Meadows; they made an impressive pitch to him Tuesday. The Irish staff has also been in communication with Meadows’ father today, and those conversations went well. LSU is well aware of the battle, and this one will likely continue on into Friday.

Again, we’ll see what Meadows decides, but one thing is for certain — if he goes elsewhere, the Irish staff will not give up. They’ll work to flip him until National Signing Day.

What On3’s Steve Wiltfong had to say about Meadows during his show Thursday

Derek Meadows is the nation’s No. 41 overall prospect and No. 7 wide receiver in the 2025 cycle according to the On3 Industry Ranking — a weighted average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

He is down to Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Michigan and Notre Dame.

“LSU is the program that’s making this run real late,” Wiltfong said. “Alabama has kind of come on in the last month. Notre Dame was the longtime favorite for Derek Meadows, and they had — from what I understand — a great conversation with Derek Meadows and his family on Tuesday night as they try to close this thing. But the SEC programs — Alabama and LSU — have been surging in this recruitment. So that’s one that could still go a few different ways in my opinion, as they continue to have final dialgoues with these coaching staff.

“A source close to Meadows told me that LSU was surging, so that indicated to me that maybe they were in pole position here. As the week started, I think some folks around Baton Rouge were feeling good about it. But Alabama has been a mainstay in this one, Notre Dame has been in it as long as possible — one of their top targets regardless of position.

“And it’ll be interesting to see if what Meadows does maybe impacts Travis Smith,” Wiltfong continued. “Travis Smith had a great visit to Alabama, Alabama is one of his finalists. Alabama is trying to close Caleb Cunningham, they’re trying to close Derek Meadows, they’re in it for Kaliq Lockett. LSU — they missed out on CJ Wiley, they’re battling for Jaime Ffrench, but they poured a lot into Derek Meadows. Notre Dame — Derek Meadows is one of the guys they targeted as, ‘We have to have’ in this class as they try to work their way back into the top five.”

Notre Dame or the field for Meadows?

When asked if he would take Notre Dame or the field in this recruitment, Wiltfong currently has a different answer than he might have earlier in the week.

“(Tuesday), I would’ve taken the field. But I talked to a source Wednesday morning — I think Notre Dame, there’s some optimism back around Notre Dame that it was a good conversation and it was left in a good place. This is one that’s pretty tight here as the Meadows family tries to get this thing figured out going into Saturday.”

The post Lucky Charms: Latest on 2025 WR Derek Meadows as of Thursday night appeared first on On3.