Not a Full-Time Starter, But Bruener Lately Has Been Pac-12's Best LB

For the past two weeks, he was the league's best tackler — and it wasn't even close.

Carson Bruener was one of the first players to leave Tuesday's University of Washington football practice, and he did so in a hurry, sprinting past a large gathering of media members waiting to do interviews, on his way to the locker room.

The Husky linebacker couldn't take any questions, couldn't ponder any pressing queries. Of all things, he had a class to attend.

These days, Bruener seems to be all over the place, yet a guy hard to pin down on and off the football field. He's someone everyone would like to quiz about the following, such as why aren't you a full-time starter?

It's a fair question. He's playing like one. 

In the past two UW outings, first as an injury fill-in for junior starter Alphonzo Tuputala at Oregon State and next coming off the bench against Washington State as he normally does, the 6-foot-2, 226-pound junior from Woodinville, Washington, piled up 14 tackles in each game.

If that seems like a lot, it was by a wide margin across the Pac-12 over the past two weeks — no other conference player reached double figures in both of his final two regular-season games, no other defender had more than 12 tackles in any one outing and no one came close to Bruener's 28-tackle total.

"You want to make sure you're peaking at the right time and that's exactly what he's doing," UW co-defensive coordinator William Inge said.

Without question, Bruener has been covering a lot of ground lately, not just bringing down opposing players, but violently knocking them off their feet. 

Still, he was a reserve, a well-utilized sub, when rotating in and out of the Apple Cup. 

The situation for him is this: Bruener plays in a highly competitive position group, where the season-long starters have been senior Edefuan Ulofoshio and Tuputala, players with ample credentials.

Ulofoshio, a 2020 second-team All-Pac-12 selection before injuries derailed his career for two seasons and a 24-game starter, regularly grades out weekly among the nation's top linebackers.

Tuputala, a 2022 All-Pac-12 honorable-mention pick and similarly a 24-game starter, recently showed off his playmaking skills with a 76-yard interception return against Utah though he dropped the football a yard shy of the goal line for an inexplicable gaffe. 

Add to them senior Ralen Goforth, a USC transfer and 17-game starter for the Trojans and there is no shortage of proven linebackers.

Carson Bruener has come up with 14 tackles in each of the past two Husky games :: Steven Bisig/USA TODAY Sport

Bruener has a track record that extends over three seasons. He was a starter for five games in 2021, filling in for the injured Ulofoshio, before Kalen DeBoer's coaching staff took over. In his first game-opening assignment back then, he supplied a dominant 16-tackle, 1.5-sack outing against Stanford and earned Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Week honors. 

He currently ranks third on the team in tackles with 73, trailing only Ulofoshio's 77 and safety Dominique Hampton's 89. He remains circumspect about his current role. 

"They're going to play the best players and they're going to put in who they want to put in," Bruener said during spring practice. "At the end of the day, all I can do is come out here and play football and do my best, and come out with 100 percent effort on every single play."

He's even been good before against Oregon, the UW's opponent Friday in Las Vegas in the Pac-12 championship game. Two years ago, Bruener showed off his open-field speed by intercepting an Oregon pass and returning it 50 yards to the Ducks 6.

Asked if it was difficult to change the Husky linebacker pecking order and the rotation so late in the season, because, after all, this team is unbeaten in 12 games, Inge pushed back on that assertion.

"They know and understand the best guys play," the coach said. "Those guys who are playing well and making those plays are going to be in when it counts the most."

Inge has to make sure his players are fresh and fast at all times, hence the constant shuffle of linebackers, which includes junior Drew Fowler, too. 

Bruener used to play primarily next to Goforth, but he now tends to pair up with everyone else on the second row at various times. Against WSU, Bruener and Tuputala even played together whereas in the past they typically might replace each other.

For that matter, while Bruener didn't get his name announced over the public-address system as an Apple Cup starter, he was duly rewarded over the course of the action against the Cougars.

"All of those guys play," Inge said. "When you look at how the substitutions came out during the game, Carson played the most of all the guys."

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