The Irish are starting to finalize their 2021 recruiting class and the newest addition is Tennessee linebacker Prince Kollie.
— Prince Kollie (@p_kollie_21) August 7, 2020
Kollie has started since his sophomore year on varsity, his tackles increased from 65 his first year to 78 in his second. He also added two more tackles for loss from the year prior with 4 total in his junior year. Kollie added two sacks to his junior stats along with an interception while causing 3 fumbles and recovering one. He did this in two less games as well.
[protected-iframe id=”adb7c586463e20f4bf95bc86cda919a9-162776928-178902091″ info=”//www.hudl.com/embed/video/3/9889310/5dc8a6217bdd490dfc65caac” width=”640″ height=”360″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen=””]
After watching his highlight reel, the 6-foot-2-inch and 200-pound ‘backer shows a great nose for the football. Kollie lines up all over the field, from a strong safety in the box, blitzing off the edge, to a stand-up defensive end rushing the passer. He is a willing tackler and shows great hands, Collie caught 65 passes for 1,085 yards and 9 TD’s last year. Collie’s run defense is much more ahead of his coverage skills at the moment, he does play well when the play is in front of him. This could eventually lead to him moving back to safety at some point in his career. Although he is most likely going to start out as an outside linebacker, he could ultimately be looked at as a hybrid defender like Clemson had with Isaiah Simmons, making plays from different positions.
When Collie arrives on campus, defensive coordinator Clark Lea will have to figure out if Collie will join him in the linebacker’s room or if he’ll start out in the defensive back room with Terry Joseph. My guess would be starting off with Lea, due to the fact that the Irish did not sign a true linebacker in last years recruiting class. Either way, it’s a good problem for Brian Kelly to have as we welcome Prince Kollie to the Notre Dame family.