UGA 5-star signee Nakobe Dean, who has been called “another Roquan Smith,” is quickly making his presence felt for the Bulldogs.
On Saturday, Dean’s high school coach attended UGA’s scrimmage and tweeted out afterwards that young linebacker was “repping with the 1s.”
Obviously, things could change before the football season – or even next Saturday’s G-Day spring football scrimmage. But that’s a big leap for Dean, who only a few months ago was enjoying his senior year in high school at Horn Lake, Miss.
None of this is surprise. Dean has been turning head since he enrolled early at UGA in January. This from UGA defensive lineman David Marshall last month, via DawgNation’s Connor Riley:
“He another Roquan. He’s got speed, he’s fast. He’s smart. He already knows more plays than most of the other freshmen.”
DawgNation’s Jeff Sentell asked Dean’s high school coach to compare the film of the two standout linebackers when they were coming out of high school. And Dean’s coach high school coach — Brad Boyette — can see the vision.
“I’m sitting here looking at this film of Roquan here,” Boyette told Sentell. “Then I’m looking at Nakobe and I have to take a second and sort it all out. I’m looking at these films and I swear at times I can’t really figure out which one is which.”
“This is sort of fun. But at the same time, it is almost a little scary. There are a lot of similarities. I have to catch myself with ‘Ok this is Roquan again’ and then ‘This is Nakobe’ here.”