Jarrad Davis may not have been the most highly touted recruit when he got to UF, but his play as of late garnered some high praise from one of his coaches on Monday.
"He’s competitive like Jon Vilma," linebackers coach Randy Shannon said of Davis. "Vilma, if you played cards, he’d play you all night until he beat you. That’s how Jarrad is. He never quits. He’s going to win. So if you’re competing at dominoes or a game, you’re gonna be up all night dealing with him until you let him win."
That competitive nature has propelled Davis into his role as the leader of Florida’s linebacking corps, where he’ll be tasked with filling the void left by last season's leading tackler Antonio Morrison come fall. But that wasn’t always the expectation.
Davis came to UF as part of a 2013 recruiting class that featured an unusually large four-man linebacker group.
Of the four, Alex Anzalone, Daniel McMillian and Matt Rolin arrived as four-star prospects billed as being among the top 150 players in the country.
Then there was Davis.
A forgotten man at the time, he came in as a three-star recruit and was rated as the 494th-best player in the country by 247Sports.
Yet, in the three years all four players have been on campus, Davis has found the most success of the group by far. His 98 tackles last season — good for second-most on the team — were 75 more than Daniel McMillian, the next-closest of the group.
Aside from his competitive nature, Shannon also credits a few other areas of Davis’ game for his success. And he threw out more big names to do it.
"Athletically, he’s like Jon Beason with the speed and the power," Shannon said. "And knowledge like Ray (Lewis) was. He knows what to do, he knows how to get the guys lined up and he knows how to protect certain guys on the defense on a call or something like that, so he’s very knowledgeable."
But while Davis’ emergence was a welcome development, it also posed a question.
What happened to the other three linebackers in the 2013 class?
The answer, for the most part, can be chalked up to injuries.
Anzalone finally got his shot to start last season but was lost to a shoulder injury two games in.
Rolin’s injury history was more lengthy: two torn ACLs, a back injury at the start of 2015 and only three games played at the end of his third season in Gainesville.
"He’s getting better. He’s not where we want him to be as a senior, but he’s gotta keep grinding and keep working," Shannon said of Rolin.
McMillian is the outlier of the group, as he hasn’t dealt with injuries. He just hasn't played well enough to see the field as a linebacker in his first three years.
However, Shannon believes that could change this season — especially with McMillian moving from weak-side linebacker to strong-side linebacker.
"Great things ahead for us and for him," Shannon said. "Him learning the weak side and now that he’s able to play the strong side, now we gain two positions out of one. That’s how you build depth."
And developing that depth — starting with Davis, Anzalone, McMillian and Rolin — will be key to the success of Florida’s linebackers this season.
"It’s our time to step up," Davis said.
"It’s our time to take the torch and play our role. It’s our time to make plays for this team and put our defense in the position to win games."
Contact Ethan Bauer at ebauer@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @ebaueri.
UF linebackers coach Randy Shannon looks on during Spring practice at the Sanders Practice Fields on March 16, 2016.
