Trevin Wallace: Meet the Kentucky Football Rookies

You’ve seen their recruiting profiles and watched their high school highlight reels. Now it’s time to meet the Kentucky football rookies that will be making plays at Kroger Field for years to come. After profiling Chris Lewis, Jager Burton and La’Vell Wright, let’s take a closer look at a day one impact player, Trevin Wallace.

Trevin Wallace’s Physical Tools

Most athletes enter the college ranks unprepared to withstand the physicality of SEC football. Wallace is an exception to the norm.

A 6-foot-2, 225 pound linebacker, On3 Sports ranks Wallace as the No. 41 player in the 2021 recruiting class. As a senior at Wayne County High School (Ga.) he totaled 96 tackles, 12.0 TFLs, 5.0 sacks, three forced fumbles and an interception. He also played offense, rushing for just shy of 1,000 yards and scoring seven touchdowns. In his final game, Wallace rushed 382 yards and three touchdowns on only 28 carries.

New to Defense

Despite his impressive recruiting ranking, Wallace played defense for only one season in high school. He began his career as a receiver and an injury sidelined him for all but four games as a junior. He quickly learned that playing defense is much more challenging.

“On offense you learn how to run routes and block. Defense, there’s so much you gotta know: what the right man is doing, the left man, everybody else,” Wallace told KSR at UK football media day. “If one person messes up it all goes downhill.”

Fast Learner

Even though defensive playbooks may be thinner than an offense’s, defenders are given more responsibilities for each play. There’s much more to it than “see ball, hit ball.”

“I wasn’t that smart,” he admitted. “I learned you need to study the playbook to play on the field, because you can hit hard, be fast, but if you don’t know that playbook, it ain’t going to work.”

The transition from offense to defense a year ago is helping him transition to SEC football. Even so, his eyes were wide when Jon Sumrall sent him Kentucky’s playbook this spring.

“There’s stuff in high school I did not know that’s in college: football terminology. I was like, ‘This is what football is for real? My goodness.'”

Wallace’s ‘Welcome to the SEC’ moment happened off the field. Once he got into the playbook, he did not put it down. By the start of preseason practice, Wallace was caught up to speed.

“He’s a smart kid man. He’s really, really smart,” said Sumrall, UK’s inside linebackers coach. “There’s a difference between understanding it in the classroom and applying it on the field, but that dude in the classroom is extremely impressive. He’s a very sharp kid; busted his butt to get ready; he’s been around the facility doing stuff on his own all the time. He’ll walk by my office and, ‘hey man, what are you doing here?’ He’s just working his tail off and he’s got a great example in DeAndre Square.”

Wallace is Comfortable at Kentucky

A week before the start of the Early Signing Period, Wallace was ready to sign with Auburn. While wearing a UK uniform in early August, he admitted that was always the plan.

“To be real with you, what led me to Lexington was, my first choice was Auburn. But when the coaches got fired, then I started trending towards Kentucky because that was the closest thing I felt as family.”

Luckily, Auburn’s overzealous boosters ousted Malzahn, opening the door for Sumrall. Wallace developed a close relationship with UK’s co-defensive coordinator and top-notch recruiter.

“(He) is a great father figure. Since my Dad isn’t here (in Lexington), I look up to him. Anything I have trouble with, I can go to him.” He added: “I ain’t been homesick yet, so it’s lived up to expectations.”

Day One Starter?

Once practices began in Lexington, Wallace immediately caught the coaches’ eyes.

“We have some freshmen linebackers that are impressive players in Trevin Wallace and Martez Thrower,” Mark Stoops told Greg McElroy and Cole Cubelic. “I think those guys are really good for true freshmen.”

The SEC learning curve is steep, but Wallace is staying ahead of it thanks to an injury. Jacquez Jones was sidelined early in camp, giving Wallace most of the first team reps at Mike linebacker. The prized four-star recruit was expected to contribute this fall, but after multiple injuries at inside linebacker, he may be thrown into the fire right away. If any true freshman can handle the tall task of replacing Jamin Davis, it’s Trevin Wallace.