Utah Position Review - Secondary

And now the secondary. I really am not sure what to expect here.

The starting corners will be Ryan Lacy and Conroy Black, with Reggie Topps listed as the starting nickel back. The good news here is that Lacy and Black are (I believe) 2 of the 3 fastest guys on the team. Black saw quite a bit of playing time last year, but I thought that his corner skills looked pretty bad. Hopefully he has been able to work on those in the offseason. At least all three of these guys have played some for Utah. The backups at corner will be Wykie Freeman and redshirt freshman Mo Lee, with Mike Honeycutt the backup nickel back. Mo Lee has received a lot of praise from fall camp, so I wouldn't be surprised if he plays quite a bit.

There are three safeties on the depth chart, and two of them are brand new to the program. Neither safety spot seems to be locked up yet. Keith McGill is a co-starter at free safety and Michael Walker is a co-starter at strong safety, with Eric Rowe listed as co-starter at both positions. McGill is a highly touted JC transfer who just made it to Utah in the fall. Being listed on the depth chart after the spring before he even arrived on campus was either a good sign of his talent or a bad sign of the talent Utah has at safety. The coaches have been very impressed with him so far, and it sounds like he'll probably end up as the starter. Eric Rowe is a true freshman out of Texas. Utah had a pretty good true freshman safety last year in Brian Blechen, so maybe Rowe will end up doing pretty well. He did make the first-team all-Texas defense, so he seems to have a lot of talent. Michael Walker is the only safety who has played for Utah at all. He played in the final 12 games last year as a freshman, but didn't start.

Conroy Black is the only senior listed on the two-deep depth chart in the secondary. While that's worrisome that there is not much experience at all back there, they should grow together as a unit and get better as the season goes along. The next couple years should be bright for the secondary as well. The coaches talked very highly of the secondary during fall camp, and I really hope they're right. I'll wait until September 10 at the Colliseum to really make a judgement on that. The low grade here is mostly because of the inexperience. They could end up being a lot better, but I expect a shaky start.

Grade: B-