Pro Football Network's Cam Mellor posted PFN's highest-graded linebackers on Monday, and Louisiana Tech fans had to scroll only three names to find the first Bulldog. Then three more for the second. Then seven more for the third.
Alonzo Jackson Jr. is third. Zheric Hill is sixth. Kolbe Fields is 13th. That's out of 427 linebackers PFN ranks across college football.
No other school has three in the top 15. Auburn, Georgia and Iowa each have two in the top 30. Texas, Penn State and Wisconsin have one apiece. LSU's TJ Dottery is 22nd, nine spots behind Fields, who started his career in Baton Rouge.
What the number measures
PFN's grade is a model, not a film room. Per the rankings page, it folds run defense (tackles and tackles for loss), coverage (passer rating allowed) and pass rush into one 0-to-100 number, and it requires a real snap count to qualify. So it rewards production, and Tech's linebackers have produced.
Jackson has 69 tackles, 15.5 tackles for loss, nine sacks, two forced fumbles and an interception through nine games. Fields has 59 tackles, 10 for loss, two sacks and two forced fumbles. Hill has 54 tackles, 8.5 for loss and a pick at LSU. That's 182 tackles and 34 tackles for loss from three guys.
The obvious pushback is schedule. Grade a linebacker against the Sun Belt and you'll get a bigger number than you would in the Big Ten. Fair enough. Then go look at what Jackson did in Baton Rouge in September: 12 tackles, 3.5 for loss and three sacks against LSU. The schedule argument doesn't explain that one.
And the Sun Belt has real linebackers too. Old Dominion's Jackson Forrest is seventh on the same list. Tech shut ODU out 26-0. Troy's Keno Jones is 21st. Tech held Troy to 47 rushing yards on Saturday.
Built at home
What I like most about this group is where it came from.
Jackson is from Haynesville. He's the only player on Tech's roster from a Class 1A Louisiana high school, a guy who redshirted in 2024, made 32 tackles last year and has turned into a problem for everyone this fall. Today the Sun Belt named him its Defensive Player of the Week after 11 tackles, two sacks and a 66-yard fumble return touchdown at Troy.
Hill is a sophomore from Grambling who won a state title at Ruston High, a few miles from Joe Aillet. Fields is a sixth-year from Archbishop Rummel in Metairie who came back to Louisiana by way of LSU and was returning from an injury coming into the season. And the fourth linebacker in the rotation, Jadon Mayfield, is another Ruston High product.
That's a north Louisiana linebacker room playing like one of the best in the country.
The part nobody wants to say
Numbers like these get noticed, and not just by us. Mike Farrell already put Jackson on his "Portal's Most Wanted" list back in September, and the LSU tape is exactly the kind of thing bigger programs will be watching in December.
That's the cost of doing business at a Group of Five program that develops players. You don't get to keep everybody. What you can do is enjoy them while they're here, and right now Tech has three linebackers grading out with anyone in the country and a West Division title one win away.
Southern Miss comes to Ruston on Saturday. Go watch the linebackers.
