Spring Practice Roster Breakdown

Today the athletic department website posted the roster for the Bearcats spring session. There are a couple of developments which I think merit a post. For your own reference the entire roster is posted here. Let's start with the basics and the new additions to the roster.

Early Enrollees

As discussed earlier this morning there is expected to be a slew of early enrollees, the most in program history. Shaq Washington, Stephen Weatherford and Malcolm Murray were are confirmed to be on campus and due to compete in spring Football. There were also rumors that Nick Temple was to be among the early enrollees, but I couldn't confirm that. Now I can, this is the complete list of early enrollees.

The two surprises are Isiah Vaughn and Dwight Jackson. Vaughn is an interesting story, he was rumored to have committed, he was listed among the Cincinnati commits, briefly, on Rivals before being taken down. More than likely he was offered a spot as a preferred walk on. He has his own youtube channel with a couple dozen clips, each of them a play or two long, at the most. So if you want to try and parse together his abilities you are certainly welcome. 

I didn't expect Jackson to enroll early, but given that Butch Jones mentioned him by name in the Q&A with Brian Bennett a couple of days back, so I guess that makes sense that he would be taking part. Either way I happy to see Nick Temple and Jackson on the spring roster. UC is still desperately thin at Linebacker and will need significant contributions from the 5 linebackers they have brought into the program this season. Jackson and Temple get an extra 15 practices and should be well ahead of the curve come summer. The development of those two guys will be vital for the coming season.

Position Changes

Nothing particularly earth shattering here, Jones has yet to move an offensive starter to defense so there is that. But there are some moves deep within the bowles the the roster that I want to call attention to.

• Josh Russ has moved from linebacker to TE for spring practice
• Sean McClellan moved to the offensive line from the defensive line
• Walter Stewart is now a full time DE (finally) after two years as an outside linebacker.
• Mitch Meador has moved to linebacker from the defensive line
• Colin Lozier has moved from FB, which doesn't really exist in this offense, to LB
• Munchie Leguax has moved back to QB after spending some time, and starting a game, as a WR

Number Changes and Assignments

I don't think that I will catch all of these but these are the changes that I have noticed in looking at the roster.

• Solomon Tentman - was 33, now 11
  
• Darrin Williams - was 10, now 16
• Travis Kelce - was 18, now 48
• Deven Drane - was 33, now 34

Freshman are always given a number the moment they step on campus, but if they red shirt the number is more a suggestion. They get to choose their number, or have a number assigned to them before their first spring practice. That is usually the number they will have for the rest of their careers. Here are the numbers for this years red shirt Freshmen. 

• Cameron Beard - 44
• Jorian Hudson - 27
• Demetri Beal - 28
• Cory Keebler - 62
• Kevin Schloemer - 75
• Nick West - 16
• Brad Harrah - 93
• Eric Lefeld - 98
• Josh Russ - 35
• Corey Mason - 43
• Evan Aleshire - 19
• Juan Glover - 26
• Corey Mason - 43
• Tony Miliano - 18
• John Lloyd - 24

UC has a few new transfers taking part in spring practice this year. Here is their roster information.

• Jordan Luallen - 18
• Sam Longo - 66
• Patrick White - 41

Walk Ons

Last but not least is the new crop of walk ons. There are a couple of guys that transferred in from smaller schools that I presume are walk ons. I don't know for a fact that Butch Jones doesn't go around poaching plays from division III and NAIA schools, but I seriously doubt it.

• Breon Mapp - DB
• Kyle Gephart - OL
• Anthony King - RB
• Marcus Jackson - RB
• Jacob Giltrow - WR
• Brad Eiras - WR