Jared's World

The University of Kentucky’s linebacker corps took a blow today, losing freshman linebacker Qua Huzzie for the season due to a shoulder injury. The team stated that Huzzie will have surgery soon on an unspecified shoulder ailment and will redshirt for this season.

Huzzie, the leading tackler for UK pipeline school LaGrange (Georgia) High School, was expected to be one of the first defenders off the bench for the Wildcats, but will instead be the first player sidelined for the season.

“It’s a tough thing for him,” Brooks said. “He was in a position it looked like he was going to play some this year and help us, so now he’ll have to take this as a redshirt year.”

Brooks had good thing to say about the other players that will sub in behind starters Sam Maxwell, Micah Johnson and newcomer Danny Trevathan.

“I feel fine about it,” Brooks said in reference to the team’s depth at linebacker. “We’re playing people on ability and a freshman that plays is not necessarily because there’s not a good player in the mix. Ronnie Sneed has had a great fall camp. We have Mikhail Mabry in there and he’s a very experienced and capable guy. Antonio Thomas is doing some very good things now, so all of our returning linebackers, plus our new ones, are in the mix.

“It’s a shame (that Huzzie is injured), I hate to have it happen, but I guess better now than in the fourth or fifth game when you couldn’t get a redshirt year back.”

There are three things everyone thinks when they hear Kentucky: Bluegrass, horses and basketball.

But University of Kentucky football head coach Rich Brooks says the nation should be keeping an eye on the state’s football talent too, since the Wildcats have been able to find some true gems in the commonwealth. Brooks, former Oregon Ducks coach from 1977-1994, says recruiting in Kentucky has been a pleasant surprise.

“When I came here, people told me that, ‘It’s just like Oregon, population-wise, and there’s just not a lot of good players in the state. You’ll be lucky to get four or five (recruits) a year.’ That’s been proven totally wrong,” Brooks said in the team’s media day press conference.

“We’ve gotten a lot more players in the state of Kentucky than I was able to in Oregon. High school football is very good here, but there’s also a lot of talent here.

“I think there’s some great football being played here,” Brooks told The Herald. “We’re always trying to keep the best players here. If you look at some of the key people who have helped us turn it around, they’re Kentucky high school products over the last few years.”

Though the state doesn’t have a high school recruit on the Rivals.com top-100 prospect rankings, UK has had a reputation in recent years for finding Kentucky high school talent that propelled the team to bowl wins. Kentucky products Keenan Burton, Jacob Tamme, Andre Woodson, Micah Johnson, Marcus McClinton, Corey Peterson and others kept the team on the rise and relevant as Brooks built the program from ground up.