Kalen DeBoer didn't waste much time when it came to building his first Alabama football recruiting class.
In DeBoer's first season with the Crimson Tide , Alabama finished with the fourth-best recruiting class nationally per 247Sports' composite rankings.
With the help of signing players such as quarterback Keelon Russell , offensive lineman Michael Carroll and cornerback Dijon Lee , Alabama had the third-highest average recruit rating nationally in 2025.
With Alabama's attention turned to building the 2026 class, how did the Crimson Tide 's 2025 class compare to the rest of the SEC and to past Alabama classes?
In the first season of the DeBoer era, Alabama had one of the better classes in the SEC.
The Crimson Tide finished with the third-ranked class in the conference behind Texas and Georgia. Alabama had the second-highest average player rating in the SEC behind Texas, and was one of three programs in the conference with multiple five-star signees along with the Longhorns and Bulldogs.
Here's a look at the full SEC 2025 recruiting rankings according to the 247Sports composite:
Texas
Georgia
Alabama
Auburn
Texas A&M
LSU
Florida
Tennessee
Ole Miss
Oklahoma
South Carolina
Missouri
Mississippi State
Arkansas
Kentucky
Vanderbilt
In his first season with the Crimson Tide, DeBoer still put together one of the top recruiting classes in the country.
Alabama was one of three teams with first-year head coaches that finished with top-10 2025 classes per 247Sports' composite recruiting rankings, joined by Mike Elko and Texas A&M at No. 7, and Sherrone Moore and Michigan at No. 8.
Here is how DeBoer did compared to other first-year college football coaches in 2024:
Alabama (Kalen DeBoer): No. 4, 93.00 average player rating
Texas A&M (Mike Elko): No. 7, 91.52 average player rating
Michigan (Sherrone Moore): No. 8, 91.86 average player rating
Washington (Jedd Fisch): No. 23, 87.96 average player rating
Mississippi State (Jeff Lebby): No. 26, 87.57 average player rating
Duke (Manny Diaz): No. 33, 86.72 average player rating
Syracuse (Fran Brown: No. 39, 86.12 average player rating
Indiana (Curt Cignetti): No. 44, 86.60 average player rating
UCLA (DeShaun Foster): No. 45, 87.04 average player rating
Houston (Willie Fritz): No. 52, 86.70 average player rating
Boston College (Bill O'Brien): No. 53, 85.90 average player rating
Arizona (Brent Brennan): No. 55, 86.21 average player rating
Michigan State (Johnathan Smith): No. 58, 86.78 average player rating
Northwestern (David Braun): No. 60, 85.89 average player rating
Oregon State (Trent Bray): No. 64, 85.62 average player rating
Since 2010, Alabama has had 10 recruiting classes ranked number one nationally. Alabama has not had the No. 1 recruiting class nationally per 247Sports' composite rankings since 2023.
The Crimson Tide's worst-ranked class since 2010 was in 2018 when Alabama secured the fifth-overall class ranked second-best in the SEC.
2010: No. 4 overall, No. 2 SEC — 89.95 average player rating
2011: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 92.19 average player rating
2012: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 93.40 average player rating
2013: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 93.25 average player rating
2014: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 93.65 average player rating
2015: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 93.73 average player rating
2016: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 92.54 average player rating
2017: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 93.76 average player rating
2018: No. 5 overall, No. 2 SEC — 91.94 average player rating
2019: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 94.42 average player rating
2020: No. 2 overall, No. 2 SEC — 93.66 average player rating
2021: No. 1 overall, No. 1 SEC — 95.07 average player rating
2022: No. 2 overall, No. 2 SEC — 95.27 average player rating
2023: No. 1 overall, No. 2 SEC — 94.79 average player rating
2024: No. 2 overall, No. 2 SEC — 93.12 average player rating
2025: No. 4 overall, No. 3 SEC — 93.00 average player rating
P Alex Asparuhov (Fresno, California)
WR Lotzeir Brooks (Millville, New Jersey)
OL Michael Carroll (Bradenton, Florida)
RB AK Dear (Quitman, Mississippi)
OT Micah DeBose (Theodore, Alabama)
TE Kaleb Edwards (El Dorado Hills, California)
DL Kevonte Henry (Lawndale, California)
LB Justin Hill (Cincinnati, Ohio)
LB Duke Johnson (Eastman, Georgia)
CB Dijon Lee (Mission Viejo, California)
OT Jackson Lloyd (Carmel, California)
DL Steve Bolo Mboumoua (Saint-Augustin-de-Desmaures, Quebec)
CB Chuck McDonald (Santa Ana, California)
WR Derek Meadows (Las Vegas)
LB Luke Metz (Hoschton, Georgia)
TE Marshall Pritchett (Rabun, Georgia)
QB Keelon Russell (Duncanville, Texas)
LB Abduall Sanders Jr. (Santa Ana, California)
DL London Simmons (Flowood, Mississippi)
SAF Ivan Taylor (Winter Garden, Florida)
OT Mal Waldrep (Phenix City, Alabama)
Colin Gay covers Alabama football for The Tuscaloosa News, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at cgay@gannett.com or follow him @_ColinGay on X, formerly known as Twitter.
This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Alabama football 2025 recruiting class rankings into NCAA National Signing Day
