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UCLA Football Recruiting: 2015 Defensive Big Board Update

By Michael Hanna

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Oct 25, 2014; Boulder, CO, USA; Colorado Buffaloes wide receiver Nelson Spruce (22) is wrapped up by UCLA Bruins safety Jaleel Wadood (2) and linebacker Eric Kendricks (6) in the third quarter at Folsom Field. Mandatory Credit: Byron Hetzler-USA TODAY Sports

With the regular season winding down for UCLA football, this seems like as good a time as any to take a look at where things stand for UCLA football recruiting with the 2015 class. After releasing the updated Offensive Big Board this past Monday, we now present the updated Defensive Big Board.

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Since our first Defensive Big Board in July, there has been a lot of movement with regards to defensive recruiting. As of right now (which is always an important qualifier to add in the helter-skelter world of football recruiting), UCLA looks to be in good shape to bring in a really solid crop of defensive recruits. 

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Of course, the Bruins are in the unique position of having one of their 2015 defensive commitments already playing for the team. Thanks to the sharp eye of UCLA defensive line coach and Northern California recruiting ace Angus McClure, former 4-star JUCO defensive end Takkarist McKinley was able to join the Bruins in mid-September and has been an important part of the squad’s improved pass rush since his arrival.

DEFENSIVE LINE

McKinley is already on campus in Westwood, but two other defensive end recruits have committed to joining him next season: 4-star Cassius Peat (Tempe, AZ/Corona del Sol) and 3-star Rick Wade (Rancho Santa Margarita, CA/Santa Margarita Catholic). Peat is listed by recruiting services as an outside linebacker, but given that he has two Division I-playing brothers — Todd (Nebraska) and Andrus (Stanford) — who both top the scales at over 300 lbs, it’s safe to assume Peat has a lot of room to grow from his current weight of 235 lbs and that he will eventually end up with his hand in the ground at UCLA. Wade, who we identified as an imminent commitment in our July recruiting update and obliged not too long after, is a pure run-stopping, gap-plugging 3-4 defensive end and projects very well into UCLA’s defensive scheme.

The Bruins would love to add 5-star defensive end Rasheem Green to the fold, but it has become very clear that Green will be another product on the assembly line that sends 5-star recruits from Serra High School (Gardena, CA) to USC. Instead, a more realistic defensive end target for UCLA is 4-star Benning Potoa’e (Lakewood, WA/Lakes), who has escaped widespread notoriety due to playing in the Pacific Northwest but is one of the more dynamic talents in the trenches out West in this recruiting cycle.

Potoa’e is due to officially visit UCLA this weekend and take in Saturday’s cross-town rivalry game, and the hope among the staff is that the visit will go a long way towards prying him from the local clutches of Washington.

One position that UCLA has had trouble recruiting in this cycle is nose tackle. With the likelihood that current nose tackle Kenny Clark, one of the elite defensive linemen in the country, will leave for the NFL after his junior season in 2015, UCLA would absolutely love to have Clark’s direct successor lined up sooner than later. The Bruins thought they had the position filled with formerly committed recruit Bryce English, but the staff eventually soured on his lack of height and serious weight issues and, as a result, parted ways with English last month. Instead of trying to find a like-for-like replacement for Clark, the staff has moved onto another target in 4-star Joseph Wicker (Long Beach, CA/Poly). Wicker projects as a devastating interior pass rusher, but won’t be the same immovable force who can hold up multiple blockers at the line of scrimmage that Clark is.

LINEBACKER

At linebacker, UCLA secured an early commitment, way back in November 2013, from 3-star ILB Victor Alexander (Jacksonville, FL/Trinity Christian). Alexander is best described as a heat-seeking missile in human form. He’s an incredibly violent hitter and the type of tone-setter every defense needs. His recruiting film is just as eye-popping as the previous description would make it seem:

Alexander suffers in the recruiting rankings because his size (5’10”) offsets his explosive athleticism and thus limits his ceiling at the next level to an extent. Still, UCLA desperately wants to hold onto Alexander, who’s known as a tremendous leader in addition to being a fine talent, and will continue to work hard to maintain his commitment from all the way across the country.

The Bruins added another linebacker commitment in late July from 3-star OLB Josh Woods (Upland, CA/Upland). Woods was a bit off the radar, due to having to sit out his entire junior year in 2013 per CIF transfer rules, but has taken full advantage of his senior year at Upland and shown himself to be an instinctive and rangy player. UCLA is very happy to have spotted Woods at their summer camp and jumped on him quickly before other teams could see him play as a senior and try to snap him up.

Additionally, UCLA is reportedly the leader for both 5-star OLB Keisean Lucier-South (Orange, CA/Orange Lutheran), who many talent evaluators project as the next Anthony Barr, and 4-star OLB Osa Masina (Salt Lake City, UT/Brighton), who possesses the type of athleticism and two-way skills that have led many to compare him to current UCLA LB/RB/dreamboat/global icon Myles Jack. Lucier-South, especially, looks like the type of pass-rushing force off the edge that the Bruins could desperately use and have been missing in the absence of Barr (to which a certain all-world quarterback recruit would attest in a couple of these clips near the end):

Both Lucier-South and Masina’s recruitments figure to go until the last stages of the recruiting cycle, so defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich and QB coach/area recruiter Taylor Mazzone will have to continue to work hard with both to eventually reel them in. But right now, things look very good for the Bruins with two of the elite linebacker prospects in the country.

Ulbrich and the rest of UCLA’s defensive coaches would do backflips if they could land commitments from one or more of their highly-rated linebacker targets down South, but no one out of 5-star OLB Malik Jefferson (Mesquite, TX/Poteet), 4-star ILB Roquan Smith (Montezuma, GA/Macon County), 4-star OLB Jeffery Holland (Jacksonville, FL/Trinity Christian), or 4-star ATH DeAndre McNeal (Mesquite, TX/Poteet) seems likely at the moment to end up popping for the Bruins.

Still, a linebacker class of Alexander, Lucier-South, Masina, and Woods seems very realistic and would make the staff extremely happy come Signing Day should it come to fruition.

UPDATE (3:05 p.m., 11/20/2014): Keisean Lucier-South updated Scout.com’s Greg Biggins today on the status of his recruitment:

If Lucier-South plans to commit soon, then it seems his mind is made up and that would likely be very promising news for UCLA. Lucier-South will be attending the Southern Cal-UCLA game this weekend. One would imagine Lucier-South wouldn’t be attending that game if he planned to announce for another school like Michigan, Oklahoma, or Oregon.

DEFENSIVE BACK

Among UCLA’s DB targets, the top of the list has long been occupied by 5-star CB Iman Marshall (Long Beach, CA/Poly), who has been widely known as the best cornerback in the West since his freshman year at Long Beach Poly. In fact, UCLA was the first school to offer a scholarship to the man-child nicknamed “Biggie”, way back during that freshman season of 2011.

Marshall has shown UCLA quite a bit of public love in interviews and social media, and there’s no doubt that he has considerable affinity for Jim Mora’s staff and the UCLA football program as a whole. But Marshall (and his father) has long been known as a diehard USC fan since childhood and it is tough to shake the idea that Marshall is destined to end up across town. Still, Mora and Co. will work until the last minute to try to secure Marshall’s commitment, despite it being perceived as a considerably uphill battle.

However, UCLA has other recruits on tap who it wants to play in its secondary in the future. 3-star CB Will Lockett (Manvel, TX/Manvel) has been committed to UCLA since early August and profiles as an ideal Demetrice Martin cornerback: tall, long-armed, fluid, and physical.

Also fitting that description a little closer to home is 4-star CB DeChaun Holiday (San Marcos, CA/Mission Hills), who is currently considered a very heavy UCLA lean. Holiday actually might profile better physically as a safety, but his attraction to UCLA largely stems from the fact that defensive backs coach Demetrice Martin will let him play his preferred position of cornerback for the Bruins.

In addition to those three long-time defensive back targets, UCLA has, in the past few days, offered two more DB recruits who are likely to commit to the Bruins sooner rather than later: 3-star CB Colin Samuel (Long Beach, CA/Poly) and 3-star S Nathan Meadors (San Bernardino, CA/San Gorgonio). Both are long-time UCLA fans and count the Bruins as their current leaders.

Samuel and Meadors are two of the hottest recruits in Southern California at the moment. Samuel’s stock has exploded nationally, with Oklahoma, Michigan, and Mississippi State among the schools besides UCLA that have offered him in the past week. He actually happens to be the bookend corner opposite Biggie Marshall in the Long Beach Poly defensive backfield but is a solid recruit in his own right.

Meanwhile, Meadors, an explosive athlete who plays as a safety for his high school, has seen his own rise to prominence, adding recent offers from Cal and Arizona State on top of his recent UCLA offer.

A class of Holiday, Lockett, Samuel, and Meadors in the secondary would make Coach Martin a very happy man come February, and he might literally walk on air if he could add the highly coveted Mr. Marshall to that group.