In this installment of The Recruit Notebook, we meet a local defender who is coming to Miami to continue playing with several of his HS teammates, and refine his skills of getting after the quarterback: DE Cameron Williams.

Bio

Cameron Williams fits the mold of the long, lean South Florida edge rusher. At 6’5” 215lbs, Williams has the height and length, combined with the quick twitch athletic ability, that has been a staple for edge rushers from this area for many years.

Williams is the 3rd Miami commit from Hollywood (FL) Chaminade-Madonna, your 2018 Florida 3A State Champions. Teaming with CB Te’Cory Couch and S Keontra Smith (among other P5 caliber recruits from this and future classes), Williams helped Chaminade return to glory by winning States.

Like his teammates Couch and Smith, Williams has had multiple commitments in his recruitment. At first, he committed to Florida in July 2017, but that was before he really started to see his recruiting profile pick up, and teams from all over the country extend him scholarship offers.

Based on a strong junior season, the Miami Hurricanes began to get involved with Williams’ recruitment. After several unofficial visits to the Canes’ Coral Gables campus, and a reasonable number of coaches visits, Williams flipped from Florida to Miami in January 2018.

While it was initially rumored that Williams was considering a flip back to Florida, and he might even have thought about that, the talented defender has been locked in with Miami. He was a key cog to Chaminade’s State Championship team, and he got to player with Couch and Smith, and that trio will continue to team together in college. Pretty decent, if you ask me.

Recruiting Ranking

On the 247sports composite, Williams is a 4-star prospect, the #36 DE nationally in this class, #62 in the State of Florida, and #485 recruit overall.

Williams committed to Miami over several P5 offers, including Florida, Florida State, Penn State, and Oklahoma.

As a Player

Williams has great height and length at 6’5” with long arms. He played mainly as a standup DE/OLB in HS, but he’ll be a hand-in-the-dirt edge rusher in college. Williams has done that at times in HS, and did that exclusively at recruiting camps which are more tailored to that position than a standup end, so he has some experience in that role.

At just 215lbs, however, Williams will need to add size and strength to be a solid run defender. He had a tendency to “run around” plays in HS — take a longer route instead of running through a blocker/runner directly — but that isn’t sustainable moving forward.

Miami has had great success with transitioning DEs to the college level, most notably (and recently) taking Gregory Rousseau from a HS Safety/Receiver and turning him into a very nice DE prospect (whose freshman season would have been Frosh All-American worthy had it not been cut short by injury), and Jonathan Garvin before him. Williams may not have the ceiling of either Rousseau or Garvin, but he does have the potential to be a very good player at Miami.

2019 Outlook

Williams plays a position where Miami needs guys to come in and take snaps. He has height and length to affect the passing game by both rushing and getting his hands in the passing lane.

Chance for a Redshirt: 5/10

Williams needs to get bigger and improve his ability/willingness to play the run, and those areas of development will tell the story if he’s able to play a role on the Canes’ defense in 2019.

That’s it for this installment of The Recruit Notebook.

Go Canes