COMMIT ALERT: 2026 LB Jordan Moreta Picks NC State

When I spoke with 2026 linebacker Jordan Moreta‍ on February 3, I asked him near the end of our interview if he was planning on making his final decision after he took his official visits in the late May and early June time period.

He replied, “I’m probably going to make my decision before that.”

Sure enough, just a few days later–and just a few days after his junior day visit to Raleigh–Moreta made his decision to run with the Pack.

“After my junior day, I was in the room with coach Doeren, and I wanted to commit,” Moreta said. “I’m telling my mom, ‘Ma, I want to commit Monday.’ She said, ‘No, we can think about this in March, April.’ I said, ‘That’s far, Ma. I want to go now.’”

Moreta used his persuasiveness to sway his mother to his side.

“I got her down to Saturday. Then Monday comes, and I said, ‘Ma, are you sure I can’t commit today?’ She loves the school, but she just wants to make sure I think about all my options. I talked her down to it, and she said, ‘Yeah, I’ll give you Tuesday.’”

At that point, all that was left to do was pick up the phone.

“So then I called coach Eliot first. I told him I was committing. He was in the room with the whole defensive staff, and I could hear them in the background going, ‘Woo!’ and clapping. That felt good for me. Then I called coach Doeren, and he was pretty fired up about it. After, I called coach Moore, who was a starter here, and he was super fired up about it. It’s a good place. It feels like home.”

For Moreta, there were a few deciding factors that convinced him that now was the time to make his decision, and that putting it off for the sake of putting it off was unnecessary.

“First and foremost, it’s Power Four football. Second, it’s the second-most winning team in the ACC. Third, as soon as I got through the door at junior day, coach Eliot was there waiting to give me a hug, and I go in there with coaches I’ve never talked to before, and they’re going, ‘Oh, you’re Jordan. We love your tape.’ I love the staff. It just felt like home.”

At 6’1 and 220 pounds, Moreta profiles at linebacker for NC State, and defensive coordinator DJ Eliot has already laid out his vision for the young prospect out of Paramus Catholic in New Jersey.

“I think I’ll be the Will linebacker,” Moreta said. “I might be coming off the edge a little bit, but I’ll be the linebacker in the box that’s more to the cover side.”

Turn on Moreta’s junior year highlights, and it’s easy to see why he might project to play in space. On the second play of his tape, he quickly diagnoses a jailbreak screen, snatches it out of the air, and houses it for six. All of that after missing a week with a broken thumb and returning to the field with a full cast.

“That week, I was watching hours of film. I knew I was playing,” Moreta said. “Our quarterback coach was one of the best PC quarterbacks of all time, and he’s our scout team quarterback, so he gives us a real life look every week.”

“Once the quarterback flipped his hips,” Moreta continued, “I just jumped it. In practice, the funny thing was I tried to catch an interception and it hit me right in the facemask. It was my first time playing with a cast. Our offensive line coach taught me how to catch with it, and that’s what I did in the game.”

Moreta made his commitment just 13 days after receiving an offer from NC State. In the hours leading up to that offer, DJ Eliot caught Moreta a bit by surprise.

“The day before I got the offer, I got a text, and then a few seconds later, coach Eliot called me and said, ‘I’m in the parking lot. Can you help me? I don’t know where I’m at. Can you come pick me up?’ Nobody told me he was going to be there.”

Moreta continued, “So I go get coach Eliot and we go to my head coach’s office, and we had a great talk. The next morning he calls me, and he says, ‘Just to let you know, we’re going to offer you.’ I was jumping up and down.”

Eliot has proven to be a surging presence on the recruiting trail for NC State during his short time in Raleigh, and that rings true for Moreta.

“Me and coach Eliot have a great relationship building right now,” he said. “It’s been nothing but good things since I met him.”

Days after receiving the offer, Moreta found himself making the trip south for NC State’s junior day recruiting event. The one-on-one time he received with coach Doeren was a critical factor in his early commitment.

“It’s a big junior day,” Moreta said. “[Coach Doeren] introduces himself to everyone, but he can’t talk to every single kid one-on-one. I was sitting down and coach Moore tapped me and my mom and said, ‘Go upstairs and talk to coach Doeren.’ We went upstairs and we were talking about football. He was talking about being a linebackers coach.”

Then, the conversation shifted.

“I asked him how the process would be with committing,” Moreta said. “If I had to commit on an official visit or what. He said I had a committable offer, so whenever that time comes, just give him that call. Him and my mom were bonding good. It was a great overall one-on-one meeting.”

Moreta, who chose NC State over Duke, Liberty, Illinois, and Michigan State, becomes the fourth commitment in the 2026 class.

Moreta does not have a date set for an official visit at this time. When asked if he’s planning on scheduling other official visits just to make sure he’s solid in his decision, Moreta had a firm answer.

“No sir, I’m not. That’s one thing coach Doeren made clear. ‘If you commit, give me your word,’ and I’m a man of my word. I’m not going on any other official visits.”