When two-year starter Aleksey Lanis retired midway through the UCLA football team’s spring practices, the Bruins turned to Sean Sheller to fill the spot at right tackle. Sheller, a redshirt sophomore who had never played in a game before, said he was motivated by Lanis’ departure.
But now the Bruins will have to find yet another replacement at right tackle after a bizarre injury to Sheller’s knee will sideline him the 2008 season.
On Friday, June 20, Sheller was driving a vehicle resembling an all-terrain vehicle with his sister and some of her friends when the vehicle began to tip over. Sheller tried to brace the vehicle with his left leg as it fell over, which put an extreme amount of pressure on his knee, and tore his anterior cruciate ligament and his medial collateral ligament.
UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel said that Sheller was “devastated” in a statement released by the school Thursday.
“It really hasn’t hit me that I won’t be able to play this year,” Sheller said in the statement.
Neuheisel said the offensive line was his biggest concern during spring practice. The unit has just two returning starters: junior left tackle Micah Kia and senior center Micah Reed. The defensive line dominated during most of the team’s scrimmages.
The other starters on the line will most likely be Darius Savage at left guard and Nick Ekbatani at right guard.
Ekbatani, a 6-foot-4-inch redshirt junior, did not play at all last year because of an injury. He played sparingly in 2006 after he transferred to UCLA from Los Angeles Harbor College. Savage is known best for his prowess as a thrower for the UCLA track and field team. He only saw the field for special teams duty last season.
The one reassurance the Bruins have is their new offensive line coach, Bob Palcic, who brings an impressive track record to Westwood. Palcic has coached for more than 30 years, and his gaudy list of former players includes Outland trophy winners Jonathan Ogden, a former Bruin, and Joe Thomas, a former standout at Wisconsin.
Sheller’s spot will most likely be filled by redshirt freshman Mike Harris. Harris is 6 feet 5 inches and weighs 311 pounds. He said during spring practice that he needed to work specifically on his footwork and on getting stronger. In an April 21 interview with the Daily Bruin, Harris said that after Lanis’ departure he knew he would probably be called on if Sheller ever sustained an injury.
“I know that if Sean Sheller goes down, I’m in,” he said.
The Bruins will add two offensive linemen in their incoming class ““ Jeff Baca and Connor Bradford ““ but Neuheisel has said he doesn’t expect freshman linemen to compete for starting jobs simply because they’ll need to build up strength to compete at the collegiate level first.
Donovan Edwards, a tackle from Diablo Valley Junior College, committed to transfer to UCLA, but the Los Angeles Daily News has reported that he still needs to pass two classes in order to meet UCLA’s academic requirements.
BARTLETT DIES: Former UCLA football great Ray Bartlett died last Sunday. He was 88. Bartlett was one of only four black players on the UCLA football team in 1939, he was also a great friend of former Bruin and baseball Hall of Famer Jackie Robinson. After his playing career was over, Bartlett served in World War II and worked for the Pasadena Police Department.