As National Signing Day came to close, LSU finished with the No. 3 ranked recruiting class, according to the recruiting service 247sports.com. 
Even though the Tigers came up short of a No. 1 ranked class, LSU football coach Les Miles is still excited about his class.
“The signing class, again, whether it’s No. 1 or No. 3, you get the guys that you need to fill the holes that you need, and you do so with great players,” Miles said. “Goals of this class certainly were to meet specific needs.”
In total, LSU signed 23 players with 17 of them are in-state recruits.
Rummel High School product cornerback Kristian Fulton headlined signing day for LSU. Fulton, a five-star recruit and top-ranked player in the state, signed with LSU over Arkansas and Florida. With his commitment, the Tigers secured nine of the top 10 players in the state of Louisiana.
“I think they enjoy walking into that stadium and playing,” Miles said. “I think there was a group of men in this class that want to win another National Championship right here in the state of Louisiana for friends and family.”
Signing day is always full of surprises, and LSU ended up getting a last-minute signing from three-star offensive guard Lloyd Cushenberry. The 6-foot-4, 310 pound prospect previously verbally committed to South Carolina, but the Dutchtown High product flipped to LSU after he received a late offer from Les Miles and company on Sunday.
Although LSU came into to National Signing Day with the No. 1 class by most recruiting outlets, the Tigers missed out on two prospects that could have kept them atop the rankings.
Four-star linebacker Erick Fowler from Manor, Texas, was a long time LSU-commit, before inking his letter of intent to the University of Texas on Wednesday. Fowler received pressure from family to stay home and heavy attention from Texas Longhorn coach Charlie Strong to flip to the Longhorns.
“It’s never fun,” said Miles of the loss of Fowler.
LSU also missed out four-star cornerback Trayvon Mullen. The Pompano Beach, Florida native decided to sign with a different group of Tigers when he announced his commitment to Clemson. The 6-foot-1, 168-pound defensive back was predicted by many recruiting outlets to pick LSU.
Regardless of the class’ rankings, Miles stressed the quality of this class will be decided by the 23 newest Tigers’ development and acceptance of the culture surrounding the program.
“We’ll really find out about this class in time,” Miles said. “After they get in the weight room, they work on their speed, they take coaching, they accept the culture here at LSU. We do hard things at LSU culture.”
You can reach Josh Thornton on Twitter @JoshT_TDR