Time for Some UW Player Realignment: A Look at Right Edge Rusher

The Huskies could have a spirited position battle to determine ZTF's running mate.

Fall camp is less than a month away. July is typically the time when University of Washington football coaches and players take a well-deserved break. 

With a new staff, many of those guys are house-hunting. With USC and UCLA ready to move out, the athletic department is conference-hunting.

Amid all of the realtors and vultures circling over Montlake these days, it's time to get back to some basics — to consider a potential Husky lineup and peruse the depth chart at each of the 22 starting slots.

With Kalen DeBoer heading into his first season in Montlake, a lot of stuff is still in flux in terms of personnel moves. Yet following 15 spring practices, some obvious trends became apparent. 

We begin this three-week exercise leading into the first fall practice by looking at what was once an outside linebacker in Jimmy Lake's defensive scheme and now is referred to as simply an edge rusher. 

While the players who handle these corner assignments appear to be interchangeable, we'll set things in motion by beginning on the right side, where there's more mystery involved.

On paper, this might be one of the better Husky position battles for the month of August. 

Bralen Trice against Jeremiah Martin.

Young prodigy vs. one-time SEC veteran.

New and old.

While DeBoer says he has no depth chart hanging on the wall, that people know where they stand by word of mouth, we offer the following edge-rusher position ranking:

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EDGE RUSHER

1) Bralen Trice, 6-4, 256, Soph., Phoenix, Ariz.

2) Jeremiah Martin, 6-4, 261, Sr., San Bernardino, Calif. 

3) Maurice Heims, 6-5, 251, R-Fresh., Hamburg, Germany

4) Lance Holtzclaw, 6-3, 201, Fr., Dorcester, Mass.

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Trice is the guy forever stamped by former UW outside-linebacker coach Ikaika Malloe as someone who will be better than Joe Tryon-Shoyinka, the ex-Husky pass rusher turned NFL first-round draft pick and being made into a starter by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Of course, Malloe is now at UCLA and no longer has to answer for his bold assessment.

However, Trice was one of those guys who advanced his game during last fall's 4-8 debacle. After sitting out the COVID-shortened 2020 season, the Arizona native made his Husky debut and played in all 12 games. 

He worked his way into the starting lineup for the final two outings against Colorado and Washington State, earning a first-team promotion following a pair of sacks against Arizona State. He wowed everyone early in the year by returning an Arkansas State fumble 72 yards for a touchdown. 

"He's a high-effort guy who runs well and he brings it all," DeBoer said of Trice. "He's just a well-rounded football player. I like who he is."

Jeremiah Martin makes a practice pit stop.  / Dan Raley

The job appears to be Trice's to lose except that Martin impressed the new coaching staff with his physicality during spring football and rotated in and out of the No. 1 lineup. Coincidentally, he made his first collegiate start opposite Trice in last November's Apple Cup.

Martin has seen it all as a one-time 4-star recruit who played in 32 games over three seasons at Texas A&M, 43 overall counting his UW stay. He's a little bigger now. He'll pushing hard to bypass Trice. 

Maurice Heims meets with fans at the end of spring ball.  / Dan Raley

Behind them are a pair of untested players in Heims and Holtzclaw. The Huskies put some weight on the big German and let him try and move up the ranks in April. They need to put a lot more meat on the newly arrived Holtzclaw who weighs in at 201 pounds. While he might be lacking in girth the Massachusetts native by way of Arizona arrives with a catchy calling card, answering to the nickname "Showtime."

The Huskies really suffered at edge rusher last season, losing both projected starters and former first- and second-team All-Pac-12 selections Zion Tupuola-Fetui and Ryan Bowman to injuries for nearly a half season each. That's a lot of veteran manpower to strip away and not feel some consequences.

Their absence enabled a young Cooper McDonald to play a full season, but the results were negligible for the UW because he took his development and transferred to San Diego State to play alongside his brother. As much as Lake praised McDonald's play, he might have had trouble playing a lot had he stayed and gone head to head with Trice and ZTF.

Conclusion: ZTF is back as the starter on the other side, looking to pick up where he left off in 2020, when he rang up 7 sacks in four games. He just needs a dependable running mate to emerge in Trice or Martin. We think it will be Trice when the No. 1 defense takes the field. 

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