101 Days of BC Football: Steven Daniels, #52

There is an old adage: better late than never. On some occasions, players commit to Boston College in whatever sport but their academic standing is not where it needs to be in order to be a student-athlete here. Such was the case of Steven Daniels, who essentially spent the last year in exile while pulling his grades up.

Daniels has one thing in common with a current and a former linebacker on this football team: the St. Xavier connection. The young linebacker from Cincinnati went to the same high school as Luke Kuechly and teammate Sean Duggan. He was the Cincinnati Defensive Player of the Year in his senior season of 2010, a year in which he had a whopping 34 tackles for a loss (even Kuechly only had 12 in 2011, though against much more talented competition). Daniels was rewarded for his very solid high school career with a four-star ranking, and committed to Boston College to join its 2011 recruiting class, turning down ten other BCS-conference schools in the process.

Unfortunately for Daniels and the Eagles, his performance in the classroom was not entirely up to BC’s admissions standards. This created a bit of tension amongst the Boston College faithful, as there existed the possibility that he could re-evaluate his commitment come 2012. The good news is that he remained in the BC camp, spending the 2011-12 school year at Worcester Academy as a post-graduate, playing football and getting his grades up to an acceptable level, making everyone in Devlin and Yawkey happy.

It is unlikely that Daniels will redshirt in 2012; they’re going to play him this year, even though they have not as yet deposited his name into the two-deep. Since he’s not going to get a starter’s playing time, he’s not going to rack up any big numbers unless circumstances change and he is thrust into a larger role on the defense. Daniels is the sort of guy who can quickly become one of the best players on his side of the football. He’s an aggressive and strong player with a penchant for shutting down the run, which sounds like the type of player this school usually seeks.