Spartans Offer Intriguing LB Prospect From Virginia
Michigan State, under defensive coordinator Joe Rossi, is putting a premium on the linebacker position when it comes to recruiting. The Spartans landed two linebackers in the 2025 class, and 2026 offers a crop of talented targets that Rossi will be pushing hard to come to East Lansing.
The Spartans just offered 2026 Virginia linebacker Mathieu Kanu of Patriot High School. Kanu announced the offer on social media on Thursday.
The 6-foot-3, 221-pound linebacker has a lot to offer with an athletic frame and high football IQ. He has offers from Penn State, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia Tech, West Virginia and Maryland.
With a tall frame, Kanu has a lot of room to potentially add weight and play the rush end position, something common among 6-3 players and taller in Rossi's defense. Prospects such as four-star 2026 linebacker Cincere Johnson (also a tall linebacker prospect) have gotten propositioned as a rush end.
The position is the answer to modern offenses, as rush ends coach Chad Wilt described last spring.
"This rush end position -- we were talking earlier -- it's it's a hybrid outside backer/D-end thing," Wilt said. "So sometimes, he’s going to have D-end jobs -- play over tight end, right? Play in the C-gap, be strong and sturdy and sometimes it might be ‘Hey, you're gonna be over this tight end man-to-man.
"It goes back to ... the jobs that they're going to be asked are very different ... So now we can do that from a two-point, and you don't know offensively that, 'Okay, hey, we're gonna be in our pressure package or we're gonna be in our base package here -- base calls.' So I think just allow those guys the freedom and flexibility, but then it also gives us, I think, another set of eyes that can see, right?"
Rossi has been very vocal about his prototypical linebacker -- he considers it like a sliding scale. If a linebacker is a bigger body, he wants to see downhill ability at minimum. The smaller backers need to compensate with strong coverage ability.
Expect Rossi and the Spartans to make more moves regarding linebackers in the 2026 class.
Michael France is Sports Illustrated's Michigan State recruiting beat writer, covering all things Big Ten recruiting for Spartan Nation. Be sure to follow him on Twitter/X@michaelfrancesi for exclusive Spartans recruiting coverage.
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