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#3. Keeanu Benton, Wisconsin (Interior D-line)
Unlike the edge group down in Mobile, other than Iowa State’s Will McDonald, I thought there were multiple guys on the interior who deserve to be mentioned. Nevertheless, none of those did impress quite like Wisconsin’s Keeanu Benton. Last year, he inexplicably dropped from second- to third-team All-Big Ten, despite reaching career-highs in tackles (36), TFLs (10) and sacks (4.5), along with two more passes batted down.
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Since I hadn’t really studied Benton’s tape since the offseason (where I thought based on 2021, he was a solid, worker-bee type of nose tackle), I was shocked to see this guy flash as much as he did throughout Senior Bowl week.
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Day one, he showed off his power and ability to pull linemen off himself right away during pass-rush drills. That’s along with guys oversetting to the outside and Benton blowing through the interior in a hurry with the tight arm-over to clear the blocker’s reach.
Day two he might’ve been even more impressive. He killed the Troy center Jake Andrews on consecutive reps. He beat him instantly on a club-swim combo and then getting grabbed on the latter (where it looked like he had the O-lineman’s shoulders turned and would’ve been able to get across his face) if not for the tug.
When setting up cross-face and club-rip moves generally, you saw Benton torque his upper body more than sufficiently,. When he ripped through, it looked more like he was starting a cold chainsaw, with the way he yanked that arm up.
In run defense, Benton routinely brought the fight, going from stacking at full extension to swatting away the hands, placing himself in the gap and pulling guys off himself. He did so during one-on-ones as well as full-team portions of practice. His wrestling background was on display, winning with quickness, leverage and violent hands.
Benton’s official stat log in the actual game will only read one tackle, but he did have a couple of QB hits. He beat TCU’s Steve Avila trying to slide in front of him and putting that guy’s teammate Max Duggan on his backside. That’s along with how disruptive he was all week in team drills and his effort chasing away from the play.
