Texas Tech football: How transfers that left performed in 2018
Breiden Fehoko: Defensive lineman LSU
No player in the modern era of Texas Tech football has arrived on campus with more hype than defensive lineman Breiden Fehoko. Unfortunately, no player was ever more disappointing as well.
The former 4-star defensive lineman from Hawaii was the bell cow of Texas Tech’s 2015 recruiting class. He was the No. 10 defensive tackle and the No. 62 overall player in the nation and many expected him to be the catalyst for turning around a struggling Texas Tech defense and changing the culture on that side of the ball.
But Fehoko was never able to live up to the hype as a Red Raider. In 20 games over two seasons, he registered just 38 tackles and two sacks. That is the same number of tackles DT Broderick Washington made this year alone and only one more than fellow DT Joe Wallace had.
Following the 2016 season, Fehoko transferred to LSU. The high school all-American became disenchanted when former interim DC Mike Smith was not retained in that position following the 2015 season.
Smith has long had personal ties with the entire Fehoko family and when he left the program in 2015, Fehoko found himself without the person who was the main reason he came to Lubbock to begin with. He played one season under DC David Gibbs but did not find the new staff to his liking and struck out for Baton Rouge.
After sitting out last year, Fehoko was expected to be a big part of the LSU defense in 2018. But just like at Texas Tech, the production did not match the hype.
Playing in eight games, he was able to make just 16 total tackles with only two solo stops. He mustered just 1.5 sacks and registered more than two tackles in a game only once.
When this former blue-chip prospect left Lubbock, many believed that his absence would devastate the defense. But the reality is that Fehoko remains one of the biggest busts in the class of 2015 regardless of the school.
Meanwhile, Texas Tech has received far more production from a former high school offensive lineman (Washington) and a three-star recruit (Wallace) than from a player that had offers from Alabama, Oklahoma, USC and virtually every other blue-blood program in the nation. Ultimately, Fehoko is a reminder that the stars in front of a recruit’s name don’t mean half as much as does his desire to be great.