The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
UConn picked to finish last in AAC East
Duo look to be big-time playmakers for UConn’s defense
NEWPORT, R.I. » When Luke Carrezola stepped foot on the UConn campus back in 2014, one of his future teammates simply knew him as “the guy out of Neshaminy High School.”
It didn’t take long for fellow Pennsylvania native Junior Joseph to realize that he has found a kindred spirit on the football field.
Fast forward to 2017 and the duo, who grew up about an hour apart, are two of the signature stars of what promises to be a senior-laden defensive team at UConn.
South Florida’s Auggie Sanchez is the only active American Athletic Conference player with more career tackles than the 215 Joseph has heading into his final season. Carrezola’s 22 ½ tackles for loss is tied for third among active AAC players.
There are some question marks surrounding the UConn football team as indicated by the Huskies being picked to finish last in the sixteam AAC East Division. But not too many of them have to do with the two former Pennsylvania High School stars. “I didn’t know him at all,” said Joseph, who led Wilson High in West Lawn, Pa. to the semifinals in the Pennsylvania AAAA tournament as a senior in 2012. “I knew about his high school. As soon as he came here. When he came in, it was my redshirt freshman year and he was a freshman. He is a great player, in the past few years he has missed some games but he is a great leader. He is a guy you definitely want to follow. He is one of our better leaders.”
Carrezola and Joseph are headliners in a senior class featuring plenty
plenty of defensive playmakers. With the return of starters Folorunso Fatukasi, Vontae Diggs, Cole Ormsby and Jamar Summers, they have a chance to become the first class of Huskies to combine for more than 1,000 career tackles since 2012 when future NFL players Dwayne Gratz, Sio Moore, Blidi Wreh-Wilson and Trevardo Williams helped their class accomplish that feat.
“I think we are going to have eight or nine seniors so when you have that many guys, it is great having so many leaders,” Joseph said.
The list of seniors includes cornerback Tre Bell, who began his career at Vanderbilt.
“If you go back and watch his film at Vanderbilt, he makes plays,” Joseph said, “Even last year when he wasn’t playing, he was a guy who would tell you what is going on. Jamar Summers, he makes plays, those two guys have big roles, nobody can block Foley, Cole Ormsby plays with a passion, when you this kind of talent, you just have to execute.”
Billy Crocker, after an impressive run as the defensive coordinator at Villanova, is expected to have a much more aggressive approach than the Huskies utilized when Bob Diaco was coaching UConn.
“It is my senior year and with a lot of these guys, we have been playing since freshman year together,” Carrezola said. “We got lucky because we have a good group of guys who understand the system, we have a lot of guys returning.”
Diggs is the Huskies’ top returning tackler but Joseph is the UConn linebacker drawing the most attention these days. He was named to the watch list for the Butkus Award, which is annually presented to the nation’s top linebacker. The soft-spoken Joseph has worked hard to become a more vocal leader.