Get to Know Your Orange Man: #88, DE Drew Tuazama

Name: Drew Tuazama

Position: Defensive End

Year: (Redshirt) Freshman

Height: 6’5”

Weight: 245 lbs.

Hometown: Raleigh, N.C.

High School: Jireh Prep

2019 stats: Played in one game last year vs. Holy Cross, and recorded two tackles before unfortunately getting ejected for targeting.

2020 projections: The Syracuse Orange’s new 3-3-5 scheme should make things relatively interesting on the line, reducing the number of players you really need in the trenches. McKinley Williams and Kinglsey Jonathan would figure to have two of those spots. That leaves the other for Josh Black and Tuazama, among others.

How’d he get here?: After a year of prep school, Tuazama picked Syracuse over a bunch of other P5 offers that potentially varied in how commit-able they were following his initial high school recruitment. Those schools included Florida State, Miami, Maryland, Ole Miss and Rutgers, among others.

What’d recruiting sites say?: Three stars all around.

Money quote: We mentioned that targeting call above, and Dino Babers certainly didn’t agree with it (or the similar call vs. Tyrell Richards in that game):

“I’ve seen hits like that on Thanksgiving Day in the backyard on brothers versus brothers, and nobody had to go tell mom and dad that they got hit that hard.”

Twitter feed: @hoop_state15

Tweets of wonder: Given the fact that he’s 6-foot-5, you might already imagine that he’s both pretty strong and relatively athletic. Ends up that’s been the case for some time. This is impressive for anyone, never mind a sophomore in high school.

What movie would Dino recommend for him?: Back when cartoon space epics had lower stakes and less intellectual property to worry about, Titan A.E. hit the scene. The movie, which came out in 2000, focuses on the survival of human beings by way of finding a secret spaceship (and of course, coming into conflict with aliens). At the time it was pretty ambitious, and featured a number of notable names, including Matt Damon (Cale) and Drew Barrymore (Akima).

Interesting nugget o’interest: As you may have guessed from the tweet above, Tuazama played some hoops back in high school, and was seen as a potential prospect at one point. Here’s a short profile back in 2012 that projects him turning into a capable forward. Other early rundowns of his game also once saw him as a future ACC basketball player.

Let’s get a look at ya: Signing Day video? Signing Day video.