Linebacker is one of the thinner positions on the Texas A&M roster, and one they definitely need to bolster in the 2024 recruiting class. On Monday night, they made strides in doing just that, getting a commitment from three-star linebacker Tristan Jernigan from Tupelo, MS.

Jernigan is listed at 6’2” and 220 pounds, and is rated as the No. 425 overall recruit in the country, the No. 36 linebacker and the No. 15 player in Mississippi, according to the 247 Composite Rankings. While Jernigan is technically a three-star, he is the highest-rated three-star recruit in the 247 Composite rankings (so becoming a four-star recruit is not at all out of the question), and is recent offers seem to bely his current recruiting rankings. He wasn’t ranked at all by the recruiting sites until March, and in the past three months has also received scholarship offers from FSU, Mississippi State, Auburn, Georgia, Oregon and Kentucky.

The commitment makes Jernigan the 5th member of the Aggies’ 2024 recruiting class, and the second one from the Magnolia state (joining QB Anthony Maddox, who is also on the cusp of earning his fourth star). The class is currently ranked No. 29 in the country, though team rankings aren’t particularly useful this early in the cycle when there is such a huge disparity in the number of commits teams have.

Linebacker is a position the Aggies must recruit well in 2024 after missing out on high profile targets Harold Perkins and Anthony Hill in the previous two classes, and likely losing upperclassmen Edgerrin Cooper and Chris Russell to graduation and/or the draft after the 2023 season. Jernigan is a good first piece to that puzzle, but A&M likely is not done recruiting linebacker in the 2024 class.

Tristan Jernigan Highlights