Tavion Wallace Explains Why He Isn't Following His Brother to Kentucky

Tavion Wallace followed his brother from SEC stadium to SEC stadium. He heard the crowd roar when his brother scooped a blocked kick and scored. He rushed the field to celebrate a Kentucky victory over a Top 10 team. Wallace loved every minute of it, but not enough to follow his brother’s footsteps to Kentucky.

After another Kentucky win over Florida, this time in 2023, Tavion sat a few feet away from Trevin Wallace, who declared that his little brother was actually the better player of the two. The recruiting rankings agree. On3 ranks Tavion as the No. 44 player in the 2025 recruiting class.

He’s the third-ranked inside linebacker in the country, just as Trevin was the third inside linebacker taken in the 2024 NFL Draft. The two wore all-black on Trevin’s big night, one they talked about their entire lives.

“We had the same room growing up– me, him, and my little brother — so we just always talked about it,” Wallace told KSR at the On3 Elite Series in Nashville. “We had a poster of NFL players in our room. And now we talk about how we’re gonna play on Sundays together.”

Trevin’s dreams turned into a reality when the Carolina Panthers selected him in the third round with pick No. 72. Unfortunately for Kentucky football fans, that played a significant role in his younger brother’s decision to look elsewhere for a college football home.

The Wildcats made his initial cut to 12 but were not one of his five finalists. What changed for the talented linebacker?

“I wanted to start my own journey,” he said. “Say if Trevin was like a sophomore, I probably would have went there if I could have played with him. But when I knew he was declaring for the draft, I was like, yeah, I want to start my own journey.”

Trevin never pressured Tavion to make the move to Lexington.

“He talked to me a lot about it. He was like, I want you to do what’s best for you. Take your own journey. If it is to Kentucky, go ahead. But if it ain’t, I’m proud of you.”

It’s an unfortunate development for the BBN, one Wallace admittedly said was the most difficult part of the recruiting process. “You got to pick one at the end.”

Who will that one be? Florida State is the leader in the On3 Recruiting Prediction Machine (RPM). He’ll like become a Seminole, only after he receives the final pitches from Georgia, Florida, and Arkansas at official visits this summer.