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First Posted: 9/14/2014

Not 24 hours after winning in New Jersey, Penn State has landed another recruit from the Garden State.

Union City athlete Daiquan Kelly announced Sunday on his Twitter account that he received an offer from the Nittany Lions this weekend and immediately jumped on it.

“After receiving an offer from Penn State I am happy to announce that that I have committed to be a nittany lion,” Kelly wrote.

Multiple recruiting services reported that Kelly had been in attendance for Saturday night’s 13-10 Lions win over Rutgers.

Kelly, a 6-foot-3, 200-pounder who could end up playing linebacker or safety at Penn State, had originally been committed to Syracuse. He plays on the same high school team as another Penn State 2015 recruit, offensive lineman Steven Gonzalez.

According to the 247Sports Composite rankings, the addition of Kelly gives the Lions six of the top 11 recruits in New Jersey for the 2015 class.

The 20th commitment for that upcoming class, Kelly would seem to fit the mold of the hybrid safety/linebacker that defensive coordinator Bob Shoop is looking to add to his scheme for versatility.

Given that Kelly just received his offer from the Lions, this appears to be the first major result of Penn State having five extra scholarships restored by the NCAA for the 2015 season.

Last week, Lions coach James Franklin said that there were recruits who would have liked to commit to the Lions during the offseason, but because of reduced scholarship numbers, the team couldn’t bring them aboard.

Franklin said the staff had to decide how to fill those extra spots.

“It’s opened it back up where we can do one of two things,” Franklin said. “We can go back to guys who we really wanted who we couldn’t offer because of our lack of numbers. Or we can be real patient and just wait to the end on some real high-end kids who are making some tough decisions.

“I’m not the most patient person, so I typically need to sleep on things before I make a decision. Because I learned a long time ago you never make a decision when you’re angry, emotional or really excited. My natural instinct is to go out and offer everyone now and let’s keep moving. But you’ve got to have patience there.”

Penn State has the nation’s No. 7 rated recruiting class and the top group in the Big Ten, according to the 247 Composite.

Go in-depth with Penn State’s class with our Lions recruiting map, which can be expanded by clicking on the full-screen icon in the upper right corner of the frame. Click on either of the other two categories in the box on the left side to reveal offers to see where Penn State is concentrating its recruiting efforts.