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UCLA Football Recruiting: The Final 2016 Offensive Big Board

By Michael Hanna

Nov 21, 2015; Salt Lake City, UT, USA; UCLA Bruins quarterback Josh Rosen (3) passes the ball during the second half against the Utah Utes at Rice-Eccles Stadium. UCLA won 17-9. Mandatory Credit: Russ Isabella-USA TODAY Sports
Nov 21, 2015; Salt Lake City, UT, USA; UCLA Bruins quarterback Josh Rosen (3) passes the ball during the second half against the Utah Utes at Rice-Eccles Stadium. UCLA won 17-9. Mandatory Credit: Russ Isabella-USA TODAY Sports /
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Sep 26, 2015; Tucson, AZ, USA; UCLA Bruins wide receiver Jordan Payton (9) signals during the fourth quarter against the Arizona Wildcats at Arizona Stadium. UCLA won 56-30. Mandatory Credit: Casey Sapio-USA TODAY Sports
Sep 26, 2015; Tucson, AZ, USA; UCLA Bruins wide receiver Jordan Payton (9) signals during the fourth quarter against the Arizona Wildcats at Arizona Stadium. UCLA won 56-30. Mandatory Credit: Casey Sapio-USA TODAY Sports /

WIDE RECEIVERS

Coming off the 2015 recruiting cycle from which UCLA only signed one wide receiver currently on the roster (Stephen Johnson), the Bruins are in need of a talent infusion at the position in the 2016 class. And with the Bruins being able to sell the allure of catching passes from Josh Rosen for the next two years, UCLA is poised to restock the wide receiver position in a big way through its efforts in this recruiting cycle.

The jewel of UCLA’s committed receiver corps is 4-star Theo Howard (Westlake Village, CA/Westlake), who is the highest-rated receiver to sign with UCLA in the Jim Mora era. With his absolutely blazing speed (running a 4.38 40-yard-dash in the spring at the Oakland Nike Camp), Howard has elicited comparisons to former USC standout Marqise Lee, but in terms of skills, style, and body type, Howard compares very well to former Colorado star (and brief UCLA enrollee) Paul Richardson. If Howard is half as good at UCLA as Richardson was at CU, then some fireworks are on the way at the Rose Bowl.

In addition to Howard and the aforementioned Dymond Lee, UCLA has commitments from 4-star wide receiver Darian Owens (Fresno, CA/Clovis West) and 3-star Demetric Felton (Temecula, CA/Great Oak).

Owens is an athletic, physical target on the outside, while Felton is a true home-run threat from the slot and has had one of the most impressive senior seasons of any recruit in the state.

UCLA Bruins
UCLA Bruins /

UCLA Bruins

With less than two months remaining until Signing Day, the Bruins still have three more wide receivers they’re targeting and could possibly land all three when all is said and done. The first is 4-star athlete Aaron Hansford (St. John’s College/Washington, DC). Hansford shot up the national recruiting rankings after a tremendous senior season playing both wide receiver and linebacker, but his best position of the two in college is probably linebacker, where he wowed the coaches and observers of the Under Armour All-American Game a couple weeks ago with his instincts and athleticism.

However, interestingly, UCLA is recruiting him as a wide receiver and it’s the fact that the Bruin coaches were the first staff willing to let him play his preferred position of wide receiver in college that has kept UCLA so high on his list. To use a sentence regular readers of Go Joe Bruin will be very familiar with, Hansford is one of those players who UCLA will be happy to get on campus first and ask questions about the position he’ll end up playing later.

The Bruins have been selling the 6-foot-2, 210-pound Hansford on being the next Thomas Duarte at UCLA and the pitch has been working, as Hansford has cut his list down to a final two of UCLA and Texas A&M.

The Aggies got a bit of a break when Hansford had to extend his official visit to College Station last weekend because the massive blizzard on the East Coast left him unable to fly home after the allotted 48 hours of the visit were up. However, UCLA made a very positive impression on Hansford when he officially visited Westwood a couple weeks ago and there seems to be a lot of good buzz around UCLA and Hansford at the moment.

UCLA is also heavily recruiting 4-star slot receiver Damian Alloway (Fontana, CA/Summit). An absolute speedster with increasingly impressive toughness, Alloway has had a topsy-turvy recruitment that has fleetingly drawn him toward and away from UCLA, but the Bruins remain the local favorite to land Alloway and will likely secure his commitment over Notre Dame once he wraps up his official visit to UCLA this upcoming weekend.

Finally, the Bruins have been consistently in the mix for 3-star Audie Omotosho (Plano, TX/Plano East), an under-the-radar recruit with all the physical tools to absolutely thrive at the next level who has been a favorite of UCLA’s coaching staff for a while in this recruiting cycle.

Omotosho released his top four yesterday via his Twitter account, and it included the news that UCLA had both made his last cut and would be receiving his final official visit this upcoming weekend of January 29-31.

The Bruins will have to hold off hard-charging local favorite TCU in order to land Omotosho, but having the last crack at him before Signing Day will certainly be a boon to that effort.

Next: Tight Ends