While many other teams around the city are tanking or rebuilding the Villanova Wildcats football teams looks to reload with its 2015 recruiting class. The season ended in the quarterfinals of the FCS playoffs for the Wildcats. They finished the season with an 11-3 record.
The team will return QB John Robertson, the winner of the Walter Payton Award, which is given to the best player in the FCS. The team is losing leading rusher Kevin Monangai and leading receiver Popooy Livers.
Villanova received 16 National Letters of Intent and you can tell they added some depth at the running back position.
‘We are very excited to add these 16 young men to the Villanova football family,’ said head coach Andy Talley. ‘I think that we have met all of our position needs in regards to the spots we had to fill.’
The highlight of the class might just be RB Aaron Forbes of Newburgh Free Academy (NY). He gave a verbal commitment in January to Villanova. Since giving his verbal he has received an offer from Vanderbilt of the SEC.
Earlier this week Forbes announced he will honor his commitment to Villanova and he signed his letter of intent today. He mentioned that he did not want to dishonor his verbal commitment to the school.
In 2014 Forbes ran for 1,600 yards and 24 touchdowns.
Another running back highlight is a local kid, Jarrett McClenton from Archbishop Wood. Last season he rushed for a school record 2,188 yards and 37 touchdowns and his team won the Class AAA state title. It was the third state title in four years for Archbishop Wood.
In the state title game this season McClenton ran for 232 yards and 4 touchdowns. He finished his high school career with 4,536 yards and 73 touchdowns.
He also received offers from Bucknell, Holy Cross, Albany, Rhode Island, and Central Connecticut.
He chose to stay close to home. ‘I liked the way they did things,’ he said. ‘I liked the coaching staff there a lot. It seemed like a good place to get an education and to play football. I think it’s a good fit for me there because of the up-tempo spread offense they run.’
The third running back in the class is D’Andre Pollard from Neshaminy. He rushed for 1,292 yards and 14 touchdowns in just nine games last season. He is best friends with McClenton. ‘We’re going to compete and push each other to be better,’ said Pollard. ‘I think we’re going to be able to do some good things together.’
Villanova is tentatively scheduled to open the 2015 season at UConn on Sept. 3rd.
Villanova Class of 2015
Simon Bingelis TE 6-5 225 Brick Twp. (NJ)
Brandon Chadbourn TE 6-1 192 Bishop Guilfoyle (PA)
Louie Csaszar OL 6-4 290 Liberty (PA)
Adeyemi DaSilva QB 6-3 192 Leonia (NJ)
Dage Davis DB 5-11 175 N. Bethesda (MD)
Aaron Forbes RB 5-10 205 Newburgh (NY)
Ethan Greenidge OL 6-5 320 Riverhead (NY)
Jafonta Johnson DL 6-3 235 Henniger (NY)
Anthony Malaguti LB 6-3 235 Don Bosco Prep (NJ)
Jarrett McClenton RB 5-9 170 Archbishop Wood (PA)
D’Andre Pollard RB 5-8 181 Neshaminy (PA)
Datrell Reed DE 6-3 225 Lakewood (NJ)
Keegan Sheedy OL 6-5 270 Lancaster Cath (PA)
Bryan White DT 6-2 285 Henderson (PA)
Drew Wiley LB 6-2 225 Hopewell Valley (NJ)
Julian Williams DB 6-3 200 Hun School (NJ)
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