Young, Moss step up play

BOCA RATON — After safety Jalen Young and cornerback Shelton Lewis, both starters on Florida Atlantic’s defense, graduated, the Owls were in need of new defensive backs to step up this spring.

Diashun Moss and Teja Young have answered the call. Each forced turnovers in a spring game last Saturday that reflected the improvements made during the past month of drills.

For Moss, a junior cornerback out of Cardinal Gibbons who had an interception and a fumble recovery Saturday, he’s starting to see a dream come together, one that Owls coach Lane Kiffin pitched to Moss while recruiting him.

“When you come to FAU, Coach Kiffin sells us this big dream,” said Moss, who committed to FAU in January of 2017.

“You know we’re going to follow through with it.”

For Young, a redshirt freshman out of Palm Beach Lakes who picked off a pass and broke up another in the spring game, a position change in the Owls’ first spring under new defensive coordinator Glenn Spencer has worked out.

“I’m happy with my progress,” Young said. “I played nickel last year; now I’m playing safety. Switching positions was kind of hard, but learning the new defense was easy for me to grasp.”

After a year with him, Kiffin is starting to see the potential Young showed in high school.

“Great high school player, so we’re starting to see that carry over now,” said Kiffin. “Another young DB that made a lot of plays out there, very aggressive personality.”

Kiffin said Moss has “done a good job, made plays and took advantage of a position where there’s not a lot of depth.”

Moss has impressed at cornerback, where FAU graduated Shelton Lewis on the opposite side of returning Chris Tooley and often plays nickel, which also has Deerfield Beach product James Pierre.

Spencer liked that he saw Moss and Young, along with Armani Adams, Ahman Ross and Quran Hafiz, contribute in the game-like setting of Saturday.

“It’s so much different from practice,” Spencer said. “Sometimes we overcoach them in practice. We just don’t let them play.

“A lot of guys perform better in situations like that, so it’s encouraging.”

FAU holds one final spring scrimmage, the team’s third not counting the spring game, on Saturday.