Dylan Raiola’s late reconnection with Nebraska football: What led to the flip?
Jackson Reed
Published Apr 07, 2026
LINCOLN, Neb. — The call came to Matt Rhule on Dec. 10. It was Dylan Raiola, the five-star quarterback.
Ten days before the start of the early signing period, Raiola told Rhule, the second-year Nebraska coach, that he wanted to take another look at the Huskers.
Twice in this 2024 recruiting cycle, Raiola picked against Nebraska, his father’s football program and his uncle’s employer. Raiola committed to Ohio State on his 17th birthday in May 2022. He decommitted last December, three weeks after Rhule took over in Lincoln, and picked Georgia seven months ago.
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“Hey coach,” Raiola told Rhule, as the coach recounted Wednesday, “my heart keeps telling me to come to Nebraska.”
Rhule, juggling options at an unsettled QB position in the wake of a 5-7 debut season plagued by turnovers and a lack of consistent offense, challenged Raiola to be certain that he was interested for the right reasons.
“Make sure you’re serious about this,” Rhule told him.
“My life has greater purpose than just being the top recruit,” Rhule said Raiola told him. “I know what Nebraska means to my family. I know what it’s meant to me. I’d like to come there.”
And so, it happened. Raiola flew into Omaha on Friday with his uncle Donovan, the offensive line coach for whom recruiting rules that restrict contact do not apply, his dad Dominic, an All-American center for the Huskers a generation ago, Dylan’s mom Yvonne and brother Dayton.
They visited campus and saw Nebraska’s new $165 million football headquarters. The Raiolas explored academic possibilities for Dylan, who’s set to enroll next month, and they attended wrestling and women’s basketball games. Dylan took photos with fans and signed autographs.
Former Nebraska greats Eric Crouch and Tommie Frazier stopped in to say hello.
On Sunday, the Raiolas flew home. They moved to outside Atlanta this year from Phoenix for Dylan to spend time near Athens and play his senior season at Buford (Ga.) High School. After a last word with the Bulldogs about his decision early this week, Dylan announced his flip to Nebraska on Monday night — one week after word spread of his rekindled interest.
Ranked No. 6 overall in the 247Sports Composite, Dylan signed Wednesday with Nebraska as the highest-ranked recruit in the past 25 years for the program.
.@RaiolaDylan, 15, 10, 5, TOUCHDOWN NEBRASKA!#GBR x #24Ours
— Nebraska Football (@HuskerFootball) December 20, 2023
This is how it came together.
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Dylan Raiola flips commitment to Nebraska
The price of a quarterback
Raiola visited Lincoln seven times in 2 ½ years before last week. If he was to come back for an eighth trip, his father Dominic Raiola had to know what awaited.
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The Rimington Trophy winner at Nebraska in 2000 whose name is displayed above the north end zone at Memorial Stadium, Dominic has always kept up with the Huskers. He talked to his brother Donovan, awarded by Rhule in August with a raise of more than 50 percent to $500,000 annually and a one-year extension.
Dominic knows Trev Alberts, Nebraska’s athletic director and a fellow former player recruited by Tom Osborne. Other friends remain in and around the program.
But Dominic was interested in various perspectives. So he called on former Huskers Damon Benning and Jay Foreman, Nebraskans connected to the program, to gather their views.
“The first thing he asked,” Benning said, “was, ‘What do you think about what’s going on in Lincoln?’”
Benning played running back for the Huskers from 1992 to 1996. His son, Caleb Benning, a defensive back from Omaha Westside, joined this Nebraska class in October after an arduous recruiting process.
Benning said he told the elder Raiola that “it’s moving in the right direction,” and he appreciated the family atmosphere under Rhule. He told Dominic that at least a half-dozen returning starters with opportunities to advance had decided to return.
“Guys don’t want to leave,” Benning said. “Nobody’s asking for more NIL. They just want to be there.”
NIL, the landscape-changing method in college athletics of distributing payments to athletes for their name, image and likeness, factors in the recruitment of nearly every top player. In fact, Rhule last month grabbed headlines with his remark that an elite QB from the transfer portal commands a $1 million to $2 million NIL deal.
For the quarterback viewed by many as the No. 1 prospect at his position, the price could rise nearly as high. Sources close to the program at Georgia said NIL was involved in the late disconnect between the two sides.
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In addition, the return of starter Carson Beck at QB likely would have meant one season as a backup in Athens for Raiola. At Nebraska, the job is wide open.
“I don’t think Carson’s decision had any impact on our quarterback recruiting situation,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said Wednesday. “I think it was a lot of independent variables there.”
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Meanwhile, a pre-planned and first-of-its-kind campaign by Nebraska’s collective, the 1890 Initiative, launched Wednesday of last week and targeted to gather smaller-than-normal donations en masse. It raised $810,000 in fewer than seven days.
Husker Nation, you are simply the best. 🙌
Thank you to everybody who contributed and helped spread the word.
100% of the $810,000 raised in the past week will go directly to Husker student-athletes.
We need continued support looking ahead to 2024 – let’s do big things!— The 1890 Initiative (@1890Initiative) December 19, 2023
The tipping point
Rhule is not allowed by NCAA rules to direct payments to recruits. He praised the 1890 Initiative for its help in Nebraska’s bid to remain competitive, but the coach was not involved, he said, in talks with Raiola or other prospects about NIL.
The factors that swayed Dylan, according to the former Huskers who stayed in contact with the Raiolas, went far beyond money.
“Even when Dylan had committed to Georgia after Ohio State, it wasn’t an easy choice,” said Foreman, who played with Dominic at Nebraska in 1997 and 1998. “That let me know that there was tangible recruiting going on by Matt Rhule. And it’s not just the football staff. Dom knows what good leadership from the top to the bottom looks like.
“With Trev being there as somebody he could talk to, there was meat on the bone. That was a starting point.”
Rhule said Wednesday that he stopped recruiting Raiola after the QB committed to Georgia. They traded only a few texts.
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“Obviously, he has a unique perspective,” Rhule said. “His uncle is on staff.”
When the Raiolas visited Lincoln in September to watch Nebraska play Michigan, Rhule said he greeted Dylan warmly.
“I’m really respectful of Georgia and coach Smart’s program,” Rhule said. “To me, this wasn’t about Georgia. This was about a kid that grew up a Husker fan that, in his heart, wanted to come back and be a Husker.”
According to Foreman, Dominic took note as Rhule adjusted midseason to a flurry of injuries at the offensive line and running back positions.
Dominic, who played 14 seasons for the Detroit Lions, sees the game differently than most, Foreman said.
“You know what it takes,” Foreman said of Dominic.
That’s been passed on to Dylan.
When Foreman talked this year to Dylan, he said he reminded the young QB of the opportunity that exists in Lincoln.
“You have a great family history here,” Foreman said. “You have a support system that not many kids in America have.
“Regardless of where he was going, I was going to be happy for him. But with Nebraska, I told him, ‘You’ve got an opportunity that myself, your dad, your uncle, my dad never had — that’s to be a program changer. Dom is one of the best offensive linemen ever to play here. That’s great. But he never had a chance to come in and change the true identity of the place.”
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The transfer portal experiment
Even with the wheels in motion to keep the Huskers on the Raiolas’ radar through the summer and fall, no hint of a flip existed in Nebraska circles until that fateful December Sunday.
As Damon Benning’s communication with Dominic continued, Benning suspected something had changed.
“Really what it boiled down to were a lot of family components,” Benning said.
Benning alerted Rhule to their conversation with a text: “I’ve been talking to Dom all day. Something is definitely up.”
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The coach responded with an exclamation point to emphasize Benning’s words. Rhule knew.
Around midday on Monday, Dec. 11, with a Raiola trip for the weekend quietly in the works, quarterback Kyle McCord, in the portal from Ohio State, flew into Omaha for a two-day visit with the Huskers.
Before the Raiola development, the Huskers planned to sign Daniel Kaelin out of Bellevue (Neb.) West, an Elite 11 finalist in the 2024 class, and add an impact transfer.
Nebraska needed help at QB. Three quarterbacks this year combined to throw 261 passes, more than only Navy, Army and Air Force among FBS teams. Nebraska scored 18 points per game to rank 123rd in the FBS.
In the first week of December, the Huskers made contact with five portal QBs. Nebraska made no official offers, Rhule said. McCord and his family were the only visitors. And early in the evening on the Monday of their stay, the Raiola news dropped.
Flipped my 247Sports Crystal Ball to #Nebraska for five-star QB Dylan Raiola.
— Steve Wiltfong (@SWiltfong247) December 11, 2023
McCord left Lincoln on Tuesday. The next day, he was no longer considering Nebraska.
“The thing with Dylan happened,” Rhule said, “and it was honest and transparent. In terms of transfer players and things like that, sometimes you have to have difficult conversations.”
No one ran from competition, according to Rhule.
“We made a decision (that we) were going to go young,” he said.
The new quarterback competition
Still, a difficult situation existed with Kaelin.
He flipped from Missouri to Nebraska in May, less than a week after Raiola’s commitment to Georgia. Kaelin played a major role in building the Huskers’ class. Two of his teammates at Bellevue West, wide receivers Isaiah McMorris and Dae’vonn Hall, committed to Nebraska in June. And Kaelin helped land Nelson and fellow four-star prospect Grant Brix, an offensive lineman from Logan, Iowa.
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“Daniel Kaelin has been loyal to us from the beginning,” Rhule said. “We believe in Daniel.”
A member of the Nebraska staff called Kaelin’s mother, Teresa, last Monday before word went public of Raiola’s renewed interest in the Huskers. Daniel was napping after a workout.
His reaction went as one might expect. For nearly two years before his pledge to Nebraska, Kaelin had toiled in Raiola’s shadow. Kaelin emerged for the Huskers after Dylan appeared set to sign elsewhere.
“It was a lot at first,” said John Teigland, Kaelin’s QB coach with the Warren Academy in Omaha. “But after he let it soak in over the first 24 hours, he wanted to get back to the roots of believing in who he was.”
Kaelin is a competitor at heart.
“I didn’t like the optics of him going (somewhere other than Nebraska),” Bellevue West coach Mike Huffman said, “especially when nothing had changed. The scholarship is still there. The NIL is there. It’s still close to home. I thought it would have looked weak for him to leave.”
Kaelin met last Thursday with Michigan State offensive coordinator Brian Lindgren and considered a weekend visit to East Lansing. After talking with Johnson, Kaelin drove to Lincoln to see Nebraska OC Marcus Satterfield.
Late on Friday, Kaelin worked out in Omaha with Hall and Nebraska tight end Thomas Fidone. Teigland posted a video of the throwing session. Kaelin reposted it with “GBR” and a red balloon.
He wasn’t leaving.
“They wanted both of us to come in and compete,” Kaelin said. “That never changed.”
What Rhule loves about Raiola, the coach said, “is that he loves football.” It’s the same with Kaelin.
“As long as I’m not taking away your scholarship,” Rhule said, “I’m not going to apologize to you for bringing in someone else. And I want players who want that.”
After a roller coaster of events the past 10 days, Rhule has not one, but two freshman quarterbacks ready for whatever next year might deliver.
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Seth Emerson contributed to reporting.
(Photos in top illustration: Aubrey Lao / Getty Images; Jeff Hanisch / USA Today)
