Syracuse football: Will Nixon out, a new 2025 recruit in and who kicks?

Rounding up some news from the week

The Syracuse Orange have arrived in Las Vegas for tomorrow night’s game against the UNLV Rebels and we have some news to catch up on.

Head Coach Fran Brown shared some updates before leaving town and the biggest news is that running back Will Nixon will be out this week (and possibly longer). The versatile back has 76 yards rushing and 44 yards receiving in three games this season. His snaps will likely go to Yasin Willis, but it will be interesting to see if Syracuse uses someone else in the two-back sets we saw against Georgia Tech.

This will be an opportunity for Willis to get some touches and you could see Max Mang and/or Dan Villari on the field more often to help blocking. Another opportunity could exist for Jadeyn Oh or Jackson Kennedy to take over the place-kicking role from Brady Denaburg. Fran explained that he was holding an open competition after Denaburg missed two kicks against Holy Cross.

Brown also hinted that the questions in the kicking game could alter his in-game strategy moving forward.

“If we can’t make a field goal from 42 yards, you think I’m going to go from 48?” Brown asked. “Would it change your (thinking)? Some of the stuff is common sense, you know? It just becomes a different four-down territory. … It makes you think different. It makes the offensive coordinator call different because I can tell him, if you get here, you’ve got two downs.”

Syracuse also landed their 2nd 2025 recruit of the week when defensive end Nissi Ogbebor committed to the Orange. Ogebor is a 6’6” 280 pound player from out of Ottawa, Ontario Canada. He is currently unranked but will be the 30th member of Syracuse’s 2025 class.

The Orange class is currently ranked 36th nationally by 247, 40th by ESPN and 47th by On3.