If USC football hopes to put a player in the first round of the 2021 NFL Draft, writers around the country have zeroed in on one strong candidate: Jay Tufele.
The redshirt junior defensive lineman is by far the most common name that appears for USC in the various 2021 mock drafts that turned up after draft weekend.
Given his 2019 performance, which resulted in an All-Pac-12 first-team nod and USC’s Defensive Lineman of the Year Award, Tufele makes sense as a mock draft selection.
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The most promising of those comes from SBNation, with Dan Kadar projecting Tufele to the Denver Broncos with the 14th pick in the draft.