How UCLA star Laiatu Latu became 2022s best transfer portal comeback story -

Out of the thousands of players who entered the transfer portal in 2021, the one who has arguably made the biggest impact of any defensive player in college football this season is the one who wasn’t allowed to play for the past two years.

UCLA has worked the portal as well as any program in the country, but the path of the Bruins’ star edge rusher Laiatu Latu, who leads the nation in sacks per game and has helped turn what was a very average defense into the top-ranked unit in the Pac-12, is not like that of any of their other transfers or really of any other transfers around college football.

The season’s best comeback story actually started in August 2021. Latu’s promising career at Washington had been cut short by a neck injury just as he was starting to flourish for the Huskies. After a year of heartbreak, he finally got some good news: A doctor in Southern California — Dr. Robert Watkins, the same specialist who treated Peyton Manning — looked at images of Latu’s neck, put him through a battery of tests and cleared him to return to football.

That was soon followed by another gut punch. “He was so excited when he got back on that plane to go back to Washington,” Latu’s mother, Kerry, told The Athletic. “He was so hopeful they were gonna reverse their decision.”

But Washington’s team doctors wouldn’t allow him to return to the field for the Huskies. At first, Latu didn’t want to leave Washington even though that’s what it would take for him to try and resume his football career.

“Those are his brothers and he has a huge bond there,” Kerry Latu said. “It was very hard for him to enter that portal. He was so stubborn and loyal. He said, ‘No, mom. This is my team. I’m still a Husky.’ That’s just how he is. I said, ‘I love you for that, but we just got this answer but we can’t do anything with it.'”

Making the 2021 season even tougher for Latu: his team’s on-field struggles. The Huskies opened the season in the top 20 but finished 4-8.

“That was super hard,” he said. “That was the lowest point — not being able to play but also these dudes that I love, I see them on the field. I’m there at the games, at practices. Not seeing them playing at their potential, it was hard. Not being able to do anything about it or try to step up and be a leader, I couldn’t really do that. I tried to step up as much as I could, but that was the hardest thing for me, too.

“It was just hard being on a team and not feeling included. But it’s been a real spiritual journey for me, and I have got to thank God for everything. God is what has been keeping me going and really staying strong through it all. At times, I’d cry and be sad, but I’d pick myself up and get back in that weight room and get on that field and continue to do what I’ve been doing since I was a kid.”

Latu waited until the Huskies’ season ended before entering the portal. What followed was a series of serendipitous turns for the 6-5, 270-pound edge rusher. Ikaika Malloe, Latu’s old position coach at Washington who had become a father figure to the player, was hired at UCLA as outside linebackers coach and special teams coordinator. Malloe told Bruins coach Chip Kelly about Latu’s situation, that the 21-year-old had been given medical clearance by one of the country’s foremost spine surgeons to restart his football career. UCLA had worked with Watkins in the past. Latu would still need to be cleared by the UCLA team doctor, but there was reason for optimism. Beyond that, the Latus already had a relationship with Kelly, who tried to recruit him out of high school.

“When Ikaika brought his name up, I knew exactly who that was,” said Kelly. “I thought he was special when we were recruiting him. He was this big kid who could really move and bend, and I’d home-visited him. I really liked the makeup of the kid and his family.”

Kelly also had impressed the Latus in the recruiting process, Kerry said. Latu took his official visit to UCLA with his mom for the weekend of Kelly’s first game with the Bruins in 2018. “I remember him saying, ‘I’ve got six guys suspended now,’ and I loved hearing that,” Kerry said. “We’re all about accountability.”

The Bruins offered Latu on Christmas Day in 2021. He committed on New Year’s Eve, his 21st birthday. His mom helped him move into UCLA in January. He was told he could go through spring practice but wasn’t allowed to do anything physical. But just being able to put his football pads on again got him emotional.

“That first day of spring camp, I see my pads and my helmet and I’m looking at them and I was like, ‘Wow, this is crazy,’” Latu said. “‘I get to put my helmet back on. I get to put my shoulder pads back on and have no one tell me that I can’t.’ That was it.”

It was still so frustrating for him that he couldn’t have any contact. “It was just another roller coaster,” Kerry said. “He just wanted to get to hit someone.”

The Bruins staff, though, liked what they were seeing. “You could really see his movement skills and his attention to detail,” Kelly said. “He was so locked in for everything, and he had a great work ethic to go along with everything else.”

In May, Latu went back to see the spine specialist. In June, after more images and tests, UCLA’s team doctor gave him the green light.

“It was so many emotions at that point,” Latu said. “I really can’t pinpoint just what I was feeling but I know I immediately called my mom — This is the green light. She started breaking down and we had our little moment.”

Latu’s 6.5 sacks so far are just 0.5 off the FBS lead entering Week 8. (Ron Chenoy / USA Today)

Chris Petersen remembers the first time he saw Latu in person. The Washington coach had been impressed by the big defensive line recruit out of Sacramento from the film his staff had shown him. For as big as he looked, Latu moved like a running back. And he was just so aggressive. Latu was also one of the country’s top young rugby players. “He was just crushing people,” Petersen recalled. Latu played at Jesuit High School, which was in the same league as the one Petersen played in decades earlier as a star quarterback.

When Petersen visited Jesuit, Latu’s high school coach took him to see the recruit. They walked into the cafeteria, and the coach pointed to a giant kid working in the kitchen. Petersen saw Latu, who looked all of 6-5, in an apron, interacting with co-workers and students before getting to spend time with the coaches. “That was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen,” Petersen said. “He was such a good dude, so humble. Guys really liked him.”

Latu was part of Jesuit’s Angel Program, through which he worked in the cafeteria and cleaned floors to help fund his way at the school. His mom would drop him off at 6:30 in the morning so that he could start work.

“He always wanted to go early and see all of his friends,” she said. “The brotherhood is so special to my boys, and I think Jesuit instilled that in them. It was just really special to him because of the ties he made there, not just with the other students but with the faculty, the custodians, really everyone there.”

Latu was an impressive recruit — he was ranked as the No. 126 overall prospect and No. 6 defensive end in the Class of 2019 — but there’s much more that factors into the transition to college football. “You don’t know how well they’re going to pick up your stuff or how they are going to adjust being away from home, but he was even better than we thought,” said Petersen, who coached Latu as a freshman in 2019 before stepping down after that season. “The moment was never too big for him. That’s why it was so crushing when he got hurt. ‘Oh, no! Not him.'”

Latu thought the hit was just a routine play at practice as Washington was getting ready for its 2020 opener against Cal. But he said “it felt weird,” so the trainers examined him and he got an MRI. Then came a harrowing sequence for the Latus. Laiatu texted his mom while she was at work. The trainers need to talk to you. Something happened at practice. Initially, after the images came back, Latu was told by Washington he was going to have to sit out the 2020 season. Then, he would need surgery. That took place in March 2021.

In April, head coach Jimmy Lake began his first spring football media session with an announcement that Latu had been forced to medically retire because of a neck injury. “We consulted I believe about five of the best specialists in the country, guys that work with different NFL clubs where different players have had the same injury,” Lake said. “Of course with our medical personnel, we exhausted every professional we could think of to make sure this was the proper decision. So this decision came in the last couple months, after consultation with all the medical professionals.”

Despite what the newspaper headlines said, Latu said he never came to the realization his football career was over.

“You kind of have that thing in the back of your mind, like ‘Dang, it’s over,’” he said. “But as soon as I was told that, I didn’t really have anyone to talk to. I just told myself that I feel like I’m not done. I know my body. I’m still able to move and all that. I still have my strength. I was determined the whole way through.”

If Latu couldn’t get cleared to play college football, his plan was to go back to rugby. The sport had been his first love, and his rugby coach had said he could go over to England and make a lot of money professionally. Latu credits rugby for making him the athlete he is: “I love that sport with a passion and actually that whole aura around the game. It’s a loving game. … You get to play both sides and it’s a non-stop sport, and you get to travel the world as well and experience new cultures and meet different people.”

But his mom insisted he had to get his college degree. And they weren’t ready to give up on football. “I give him all the credit in the world,” she said. “That positive mindset is huge. He’s 20 when this happened, and for him to keep that mindset, he really did feel alone sometime, so kudos to him. He really amazes me. It’s such a crazy story. I’m just so proud of him.”

Laiatu (far right) has settled in quickly at UCLA. (Courtesy of the Latu family)

Through six games for the No. 9 Bruins, Latu has made 6.5 sacks, forced two fumbles and helped boost a UCLA pass rush that no longer needs to blitz so much that the secondary is left vulnerable. UCLA opened the season 4-0 but still seemed untested when Latu’s old team visited the Rose Bowl. Washington was undefeated and ranked No. 15. His mom knew how emotional her oldest child was for that game, given everything they’d been through. She texted him before the game: Block out all this noise. Block out all this hype. It’s just another game.

Latu had just come off a three-sack game against Colorado and was equally as disruptive against Washington’s explosive offense. He had one sack and drew two holding penalties that set the Huskies’ offense back in a 40-32 UCLA win.

“I really let my emotions out,” he said. “I kept my emotions held in before the game, but as soon as we got it cracking and we were on that field, I was super excited and super juiced. It just felt like practicing with them again because it was all the same dudes. It felt like I was lining up against them back in Seattle. It was just crazy.”

The Bruins followed up that performance by beating No. 11 Utah, the defending Pac-12 champs. Latu made a season-high six tackles. UCLA football is nationally relevant for the first time in a long time, and its best defender is a big reason why.

Asked whether he has any hesitation or doubt due to what doctors had told him in the past, Latu said, “When I’m on that field, I have no — I’m not thinking about anything else but the play that I’ve been given and winning. That’s all I think about on the field.”

The traits that make Latu special as a player have been honed through experiences unique to him, from his rugby background and the determination forged by his winding path back to the field.

Kelly has nothing but praise for Latu’s athletic instincts. “He understands how to read blockers and how to set up blockers,” Kelly said. “He knows how to work his counters and knows how to defeat blocks. There’s a science to it. Ikaika really knows how to teach it and you see how he works his craft. It’s really important to him. And he’s so athletic. He’s all of 6-5 and he can really bend and move. I think a lot of that has to do with his rugby background because he’s so fluid and can play in space and also strong enough and physical to play inside.”

Latu is grateful for his second chance and admits it feels surreal to be back out on the field, playing for his old position coach and doing what he loves most.

“It had been a long time since I’ve been out of the game,” he said. “I love being here in the facility every day. I love being here with the dudes that I get to play with. I’m just trying to get better and go as far as we can with this team.”

(Top photo: Jordon Kelly / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

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