UCLA Football: A Sneak Preview Of The Bruins' 2024 Defense
Welcome to the Big Ten, UCLA!
Though there's still plenty of time before the 2024-25 season commences, it's never too early to look ahead and talk football. In this case, we're going to analyze your UCLA Bruins and their prospects on the defensive side of the ball.
On paper, the schedule will be quite challenging. 247Sports has UCLA's upcoming slate ranked as the fifth-hardest schedule in the entire country.
We've already analyzed the offensive side of the ball. Most of the starters from last year are slated to return. Defensively, it's an entirely different story.
D'Anton Lynn, the architect behind UCLA's emergence last year as one of the best defenses in the country, left the Blue and Gold to take the defensive coordinator position across town at USC. It was a tough pill to swallow for the fan base seeing one of the sport's brightest up-and-comers poached by your bitter rival.
UCLA has since promoted defensive line coach Ikaika Malloe to the defensive coordinator spot. Former Oregon Ducks standout DE/OLB Tony Washington Jr. was hired to be the team's defensive line coach.
From a production standpoint, UCLA is losing its top-five defensive ends from a season ago. The obvious headliner is Laiatu Latu. A projected first-round pick in this year's upcoming NFL Draft, the First Team All-American accrued a team-high 13.0 sacks and 21.5 TFL a season ago.
Also leaving are the Murphy Twins (Gabriel and Grayson), Carl Jones, and Jake Heimlicher. These four combined for 15.0 sacks, 31.5 TFL, and 116 tackles.
At linebacker, the heart and soul of the defense -- Darius Muasau -- is graduating. He led the team with 75 total tackles and had 4.0 sacks of his own. He emerged this past year as a dependable, smart, and productive player after transferring in from Hawaii.
The secondary saw plenty of loss as well. Reserve safety William Nimmo transferred to San Diego State. Jordan Anderson graduated from the program, as did starting nickel Alex Johnson (who led the team in interceptions). Starting safety Kenny Churchwell also exhausted his eligibility.
From there, starting safety Kamari Ramsey and corner John Humphrey both followed Lynn to USC. Losing Ramsey was a massive blow, as he was projected to be the team's best returning defensive player.
While all of this looks somewhat overwhelming on the surface, there is some talent returning to the program. Kelly and his staff have also worked quite diligently in trying to fill some of these holes via the transfer portal.
Let's do a position-by-position breakdown of the entire defense.
*Note: These hypothetical depth charts are as of 1/27. Transfers can still happen between this date and the beginning of the season.
Defensive End
Expected Starters: Choe Bryant-Strother, Jacob Busic
Reserves: Collins Acheampong, Solomone Malafu, Luke Schuermann, Grant Buckey, Isaiah Patterson, Joseph Vaughn, Devin Aupiu
Defensive Tackle
Expected Starters: Jay Toia, Gary Smith
Reserves: Keanu Williams, Dovid Magna, Sitiveni Havili-Kaufusi, AJ Fuimaono, Quintin Somerville
There's good news and bad news with this defensive line group.
The group of defensive ends are both unproven and not entirely battle-tested on the Power Five level. The only guy returning to the team with any real playing time experience with UCLA is Bryant-Strother.
A high-level athlete out of Atlanta, CBS has been bouncing back and forth between functioning as a linebacker and as an edge rusher. Despite being a bit undersized for the position, having him solely focus on rushing the passer off the edge might be the most prudent thing in terms of maximizing his ceiling from a production standpoint.
Busic (Navy), Vaughn (Yale), and Schuermann (Johns Hopkins) all come from lower levels. Vaughn and Schuermann were specifically dominant players for their respective teams. However, it's uncertain as to whether that can translate against a top-five schedule nationally.
Acheampong transferred in from Miami. At 6'7" and roughly 275 pounds, he's quite impressive physically. UCLA is hoping he can both stay healthy and take the next step in becoming a more consistent player. The talent is certainly there for him to be a future NFL athlete.
If there's a sleeper to emerge from this group, it could be Malafu. A redshirt freshman from Hawaii, he reportedly has some very solid pass-rushing skills.
The tackle spot is another story. It appears as if Toia is coming back. He should be the anchor on this defense up front, and also one of the better defensive tackles in the Big Ten next year.
Smith and Williams will also come back to make up a very solid three-man group. Depth is also quite good behind these guys. Magna and Havili-Kaufusi have played a lot of football in their careers up to this point.
This is a veteran bunch with good talent across the board and considerable experience. Keep an eye on Williams specifically. A transfer from Oregon, he flashed some big-time ability last year as a reserve.
Outside Linebacker
Expected Starter: Kain Medrano
Reserves: Jalen Woods, Donavyn Pellot
Middle Linebacker
Expected Starter: Femi Oladejo
Reserves: JonJon Vaughns, Tre Edwards, Ty Lee
Malloe will likely utilize a similar scheme to last year, where the base is a 4-2-5 alignment. That's not to say UCLA will sometimes trot out three linebackers on any given play. For this exercise, we'll focus on the two starters in this group.
Along with Toia, Medrano and Oladejo figure to be two of UCLA's better players this upcoming season.
Medrano was thought to be toying with the idea of leaving for the NFL Draft. He's a speedy, physical linebacker with a real nose for the football. Medrano was second on the team last year with 56 tackles. He also notched 2.0 sacks and 7.0 TFL.
Oladejo transferred from Cal a season ago and immediately became a fixture in the lineup. Physically, he looks like he was engineered in a lab. People weighing 250 pounds should not move as swiftly as he does. Oladejo was third on the team with 54 tackles a season ago.
Vaughns is a rock-solid reserve with plenty of experience. Youngsters Lee and Pellot are plus-athletes with very high ceilings. Pellot in particular is a guy who may emerge this year. Woods is a capable player with excellent quickness and closing speed.
We aren't sure if Alabama transfer Ale Kaho will be eligible this year. He's battled a plethora of injuries since coming to Westwood. If he can play, that's another experienced body to have waiting in the wings.
Collectively speaking this might be the most talented and deepest unit on the defense.
Cornerback
Expected Starter: Jaylin Davies
Reserves: Isaiah Newcombe, Jamir Benjamin
Expected Starter: Devin Kirkwood
Reserves: Croix Stewart, Jadyn Marshall
Expected Nickel: KJ Wallace
Reserve: DJ Justice
Davies and Kirkwood returned as two of UCLA's top-three corners last year. Both aren't perfect players, but each has steadily improved over the years. Davies is more so your savvy, technical corner -- whereas Kirkwood is the bigger, more athletic type with an ideal NFL frame.
Ironically enough, three of the projected primary reserves at the corner spot (Newcombe, Stewart, Marshall) are quite possibly the three fastest players on the team. We'll see if any of them can emerge in some capacity in 2024.
Wallace transferred over from Georgia Tech to presumably man the nickel spot. He's played a lot of football and is likely among the better transfers UCLA was able to get in the portal. Justice hasn't played a ton of snaps on this level, but those within the program are said to be high on his potential.
Safeties
Expected Starter: Bryan Addison
Reserve: RJ Jones, Zeke Thomas
Expected Starter: Ramon Henderson
Reserve: Clint Stephens, Khristian Dunbar-Hawkins
There are plenty of unknowns with this group. Last year, the Ramsey-Churchwell duo was among the better tandems in the conference.
Addison (Oregon) and Henderson (Notre Dame) enter as transfers. Neither have been starters throughout their respective careers elsewhere. Both have experience playing, but it's another thing to be playing heavy snaps in a high-level conference.
On the plus side, both are very fluid athletically. This is particularly the case with Henderson. The reserves behind the projected starters are also quite green. Stephens and Dunbar-Hawkins were two highly-touted prospects coming out of Southern California. However, neither has done anything yet on the collegiate level.
Outside of production from the pass rushers, this is probably the most concerning group on the roster. Look for UCLA to try and add a body if possible during the spring when others enter the portal.
OVERVIEW:
It's unrealistic to think this year's defense can match the productivity last year's unit demonstrated.
Losing your defensive coordinator, an entire fleet of pass rushers, a future top-10 pick, the captain of the defense, and the vast majority of the secondary is not ideal.
With that said, there is still some preexisting talent on this roster -- namely up the middle with the tackles and at linebacker. If this team can conservatively be a top-60 defense nationally, UCLA could have a chance to approach at least 8 wins.
If it reverts to being a defense ranking in the 100s, this could be a very rough upcoming year with an unforgiving schedule.
