Abdul Carter selected No. 3 in NFL Draft, highest drafted PSU player since 2018
Abdul Carter may not have gone No. 1 overall in the 2025 NFL Draft, but he didn’t have to wait long to hear his name called.
Carter was selected 3rd in the draft by the New York Giants, making him the highest drafted Penn State player since Saquon Barkley was taken No. 2 overall in the 2018 draft.
The defensive end will step in with the Giants and should immediately contribute as a starter. He left the Nittany Lions after racking up 12 sacks in 2024, including two during the team’s three-game College Football Playoff run to the semifinals — while he was dealing with a shoulder injury he suffered in the second round.
His draft stock skyrocketed after moving from linebacker to defensive end. He was a projected first rounder after the position switch and his play on the field allowed him to grow even further and become a top-five pick.
His relative inexperience at defensive end — and his success there — is part of why Carter believes he still has plenty of room to grow as a player.
“I feel like I’m just getting started,” Carter said at Penn State’s pro day. “This is my first year of playing a new position and I feel like I was the best at it. I dominated at it. The sky is the limit for me. I really feel limitless. I’m just getting started.”
While Carter made his pitch to go No. 1 overall throughout the draft process, he said at Penn State’s pro day that he wouldn’t be disappointed if that wasn’t the case.
“I feel like everything happens for a reason,” Carter said at the pro day. “If I don’t go number one, it wasn’t meant to be. But I’m also gonna have that motivation if they don’t select me. [It’ll] just be extra motivation, can’t wait until I see them. But I feel like everything happens for a reason — wherever I’m meant to be, that’s where I’m gonna be.”
This is the second year in a row a Penn State defensive end has gone in the first round, after Chop Robinson went No. 21 overall to the Miami Dolphins in the 2024 NFL Draft.
Robinson was around the program during its playoff run and Carter said he was an asset for him this season.
“He helped me before the season,” Carter said. “Telling me to keep my mind focused on college and everything, and the NFL and the rest will take care of itself.”
Carter was the first Nittany Lion to be taken in the 2025 NFL Draft, but is one of several who is expected to hear his name called throughout the three-day event.
This story was originally published April 24, 2025 at 8:31 PM.
