Pitt Has Built Strong Foundation With Rapidly Rising 2024 OL Target Aidan Lynch

Aidan Lynch was being pursued by the likes of Army, UConn, UMass, Old Dominion, Temple, Princeton and Yale as he entered the month of March, but his recruiting process has really picked up over the last two weeks.

In the month of March alone, he’s picked up offers from Boston College, Georgia, Penn State Pitt, Stanford and West Virginia — and it’s just been a blessing for the Lynch family.

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Lynch — a 6-foot-7, 275-pound offensive lineman from Mount Olive High in Mount Olive, New Jersey — picked up his second Power Five offer from Pitt, just after Georgia offered, and it was a long time coming.

“I’ve been talking to them for a while now, and they were actually the first Power Five school to reach out to me, so it was pretty cool just to build a relationship overall and once they shot that offer my way, it was pretty fantastic,” Lynch told PSN. 

After a great call with @CoachTimSalem, I am proud to say that I have received an offer from @Pitt_FB! #H2P @CoachBorbs @mtolivefootball @OConnorMOFB @247Sports @On3sports pic.twitter.com/QLhnjxj1QX

— Aidan Lynch (@AidanJLynchMOHS) March 5, 2023

The offer itself, from tight ends coach Tim Salem, arrived in a way that Lynch didn’t expect either.

He had just woken up, right around noon since it was a Saturday and he had a rare moment to sleep in, so when Salem called him, he wasn’t fully awake yet. Salem told him that Pitt’s coaching staff had put together a list of players, and each player had a letter next to his name. S, A, etc.

Salem told Lynch that he had an S next to his name. What do you think that means, he asked Lynch. “And I’m like, ‘Special?’ Me being tired, I thought it was something stupid, I didn’t really understand it, and then he goes no, scholarship. So, it was pretty funny and a pretty cool experience overall.” 

Lynch has been able to build a very good relationship with Salem and offensive line coach Dave Borbely, through consistent communication over the last year, and he’s also visited Pitt twice — once for Pitt’s victory over Duke last November and once for Pitt’s Junior Day in January.

Salem has been his lead recruiter, a very funny — and a bit all over the place — kind of guy, and he’s spoken a lot with Borbely — who would be his position coach at Pitt. “Borbely is a tough coach, and he’s gonna coach you well, but he’s also a really good guy,” Lynch said. “He’s a family guy. It’s cool to talk to him, to understand him and his philosophies and all that stuff.”

“He loves my athleticism and my bend,” Lynch said. “For me, I’m actually a bit on the slimmer side for what he said he’s recruited in the past, but he said that’s aided me a bit as well because for me personally, I play lacrosse right now and then I just stopped playing basketball this past year, so I’ve really been able to develop in that sense for many years now.”

Lynch holds down the left side of the line at Mount Olive, serving as the left tackle, and you’re easily able to see the raw strength in a long, lean frame. He’s capable of adding weight to his frame, too. There’s a lot of untapped potential for the next level.

None of the major recruiting services have rated Lynch yet, but as he’s blown up this month and will likely continue to do so as the spring rolls into the summer, it’s only a matter of time before he jumps up recruiting rankings.

Lynch was supposed to make a trip out to Pittsburgh for this week’s spring practice slate, but as New Jersey was hit with a heavy dose of snow, with his grandparents needing help, he needed to reschedule. There isn’t a date planned yet, but it’s very likely he’ll be making a visit out to Pittsburgh for the third time this spring.

And in the meantime, he has visits scheduled to Penn State, Georgia, Army, Notre Dame, Virginia Tech and West Virginia in the coming weeks.

Lynch plans to commit in the late May, early June window, right after making a few official visits, so it will be important to get him back out to Pittsburgh at least once more before then. However, as his process stands now, Pitt is sitting inside his Top 3.

“I’ve visited Pitt twice now,” Lynch said. “I love the facilities, sharing with the Steelers is probably one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen in this process, because just the overall admiration you gain for — you look at the hallways and next to you is a Pittsburgh Steeler and you get to understand what they did and the grind it took to get there, and you can put your mind to that.

“Overall, the academics at Pitt, the football overall, the people at Pitt have really made it a top choice for me.”

Pitt has landed five commits in the class of 2024, but there hasn’t been an offensive lineman to commit yet. Pitt will likely look to land a handful of commits on the offensive line this cycle.