NFL Draft Bowl Watch: Temple vs Wyoming, Ohio vs Utah State, San Diego State vs Louisiana Lafayette

Happy Bowl season everyone. Today the bowl season opens up with three semi-lackluster games with some really great bowl names. Temple will play Wyoming in the Gildan New Mexico Bowl, Ohio takes on Utah State in the Famous Idaho Potato bowl, and San Diego State University plays Louisiana Lafayette in the R + L Carriers New Orleans Bowl. All three games will be on ESPN. There aren’t a ton of draft prospects to know from these games but there are enough for the die-hard draft fans,a lot of  late round guys for the most part, but a few day two guys as well.

Temple-

RB Bernard Pierce

Temple has one really nice running prospect, Bernard Pierce who is probably the top prospect on display on Saturday. Our Pierce scouting report is here. Pierce has really nice athleticism, pretty good size, and can even catch the ball out of the backfield as well. Pierce has a really good chance of being drafted on day two. Pierce is one of the few running backs in this class who can be an every-down back in the N.F.L.

OLB Adrian Robinson

We haven’t gotten to an Adrian Robinson scouting report yet, but he’s another nice prospect for the Temple Owls. Robinson looked like one of the top pass rushers in the country in 2009 when he had 12 sacks an 14 tackles for loss. He had a bad 2010, but as bounced back nicely here in 2011 with 6 sacks and 11 TFL. He’s a defensive linemen at Temple, but he doesn’t have the size to play defensive line in the N.F.L. (6’2 250 pounds) so he’s a 34 projection rush linebacker.

Lastly for Temple is Offensive linemen Derek Dennis. A big linemen at 6’5 316 pounds. I haven’t focused enough on him to give you anything in depth, but he’s one I’ll be watching him today.

Wyoming-

Wyoming has an intriguing defensive back Tashaun Gipson Sayre wrote a scouting report on the other day. Gipson is a late round, undrafted guy who could make a team and play some special teams and play on some sub-packages.Gipson has played cornerback and safety and has pretty good size.He doesn’t have the kind of interception numbers you’d like to see though facing non-elite competition.

Ohio vs Utah State

Utah State:

The best prospect in this game is Running back Robert Turbin, Turbin is the WAC offensive player of the year. Turbin has 1416 yards rushing this year with 19 rushing touchdowns and 4 receiving touchdowns. He has good size and runs with a low center of gravity. Turbin could end up going early day three with anice bowl game and nice combine, and maybe really late day two. Turbin is a name to watch as a sleeper running back prospect.

Bobby Wagner, LB

Wagner has been extremely productive this year. He has a 140 tackles, 10 tackles for loss and 4 sacks this season. He’s been productive at Utah State and is likely to set the school tackle record against Ohio. You can watch a video of Wagner playing here at draftbreakdown.com. He’s like a much lesser version of Luke Kuechly (in terms of his style of play, Kuechly is much better). A guy who is instinctive, productive, but lacks elite athleticism. He plays hard and tough though so I’m not counting him out if he gets an opportunity somewhere. Wagner will be drafted somewhere on day three. Here’s a nice write up by draftbreakdown

Ohio

The best draft prospect on Ohio is wide receiver LaVon Brazill. He’s not the largest guy (listed at 5’11 191 pounds), Brazill is having his finest season. He has 10 touchdowns this year and is averaging 16.3 yards per reception.  Brazill catches the football well and could develop into a nice slot guy in the N.F.L.

San Diego State against Louisiana

San Diego State

San Diego State has the biggest name in the games on Saturday-Quarterback Ryan Lindley. Lindley was a hot name prior to the seaosn, a guy people thought could develop into an early day two prospect, but he’s just had a down year and lost a lot of his luster. Lindley has protoypical size and a N.F.L. arm,  but isn’t a mobile quarterback and has had trouble with throwing the ball consistently.

2010 numbers:

2011 Numbers:

Ladarius Green

If Bernard Pierce isn’t the best prospect on display, Green probably is. Our scouting report for Green. Green is not Jimmy Graham, but he’s the kind of athlete that the success of Jimmy Graham will inspire teams to take a long hard look at. Green is tall, fast, fluid athlete. His high-upside could get him drafted higher than most think.

We’ll have you covered all bowl-season so be sure to check back often. For all of our scouting report (approaching 200) check out our scouting report page.  Follow us on twitter @NFLmocks