Trieu: Michigan State moves to top of list for 'quick learner' Lawrence Kanneh

Michigan State offered a scholarship to Columbus (Ohio) Whitehall-Yearling defensive end Lawrence Kanneh, a 6-foot-4, 220-pound junior this week.

Not many outside of Columbus may have heard of Kanneh, or Whitehall-Yearling for that matter, but head coach Cameron Barker is looking to build the program he played at into a must-stop for college coaches.

Kanneh runs 11.2 in the 100-meter dash and is an excellent student, so he is just what Barker needs to get the attention of major universities.

“At the beginning of the recruiting process, Lawrence had only been to one camp, a D2 camp close to home,” Barker said. “We went through his HUDL, updated it, sent the film out and Toledo was one of the first schools to come back with an offer. Then the second round of schools, we started sending it out to more coaches, and Michigan State was one of them.”The film, where Kanneh was making plays in the backfield to the tune of 23 tackles for loss and 12½ sacks last season, impressed Michigan State to the point that defensive line coach Winston DeLattiboudere III made a stop at Whitehall-Yearling.

“Coach Debo came in with matching energy to ours,” Barker said, “He fell on their radar, they came in for a work out and within 24 hours, had initiated the process of lets offer and lets get this official visit started.”

That official visit to Michigan State is now set for June 5. Edge-defenders coach Andrew Bindelglass followed DeLattiboudere’s visit with a stop of his own. In short: The Spartans are serious about Kanneh.

“He doesn’t understand what it meant when I said he had a Power Four opportunity,” Barker said. “He’s a 3.8 (grade-point average) kid who wants to go into engineering. He’s very mature, but when you talk about playing in front of 100,000 people, it didn’t really click right away. He’s just starting to understand college recruiting.”

Kanneh has gotten a quick education as USF, Marshall, Appalachian State and others also have offered, but Pittsburgh, Northwestern, Wisconsin and others also have started to ake contact.

“The best qualities about him are his maturity, his understanding of the game, and he learns quickly. He’s a very quick learner,” Barker said. “He’s a ‘yes sir, no sir’ kid. But physically, he dunks a basketball, he runs an 11.2 100-meter dash, 53-foot shot put, the kid is an incredible athlete.”

An athlete Michigan State is hoping to add to their class.

“Michigan State made a jump to the top of his list,” Barker said.

Rivals rates Kanneh a three-star recruit.