The Huskies success continues their efforts to bolster the trenches after landing four-star DL prospect Jon Ioane out of Tustin HS (Tustin, CA) who becomes the highest rated member of the class so far. Ioane joins Matamatagi Uiagalelei as the second DL commit of the class and joins Isaiah Leilua, Ethan Coach, Justin Coach, and Titus Osterman as a commit in the front seven on defense. Although Tustin HS is not in the Trinity League, it is only a 15 minute drive from Mater Dei, so there is a good chance
Ioane is quite familiar with multiple of the defensive commits already (all of the ones listed above except for Osterman play in the Trinity League).
The Recruitment: From reading many of his interviews over the years, Ioane comes across as a very thoughtful and intelligent young man who may enjoy the recruiting process, but also took it seriously. He had visited UW many times and made it no secret to other coaching staffs and reporters that they were his favorite for quite some time. Recent hires at Cal and Stanford likely made Husky coaches and fans sweat a bit, but at the end of the day UW was still his resounding favorite between the combination of relationships with the coaches, academics, and the program itself which lead him to choosing the Huskies.
Recruiting Ranking: Ioane is rated as the 183rd overall prospect, 12th highest in the state of California, and the 9th rated athlete by 247 Sports. Although he is rated as an athlete by 247, if he were to be rated as a DL by them, he would rank 20th at the position.
Scouting Report: The UWDP staff was very excited by Ioane’s commitment and we had a chance to review his film independently and discuss what we saw. The player comp that we liked for him was former Husky, Tuli Letuligasenoa. Both of them aren’t the flashiest DL, but they are very good at what they do. They both are plus run defenders with high motors and given enough time they will wear down opposing OL to get to the QB. Ioane is physically bigger than Tuli was, Ioane is 6’3 295 while Tuli played closer to 6’0 285, but despite his high ranking we request Husky fans be patient. Tuli was ready to play from day one, but Ioane is a little more raw at this stage and will likely need a year of coaching up to get rid of a couple of bad habits like his pad level being too high too quickly. Given his athleticism at such an impressive frame though, Ioane may have the higher ceiling of the two.
Roster Impact: He plays all along his DL in HS, but we see him growing into a true DT or possibly even a NT depending on how his body develops. When he arrives on campus he will be competing with upperclassmen Elinneus Davis (Sr), Kai McClendon (Jr), Omar Khan (Jr), Darin Conley (Sr), and DeSean Watts (Sr) for playing time. Not to mention the talented members of the Edge/DL class from the prior class like David Schwerzel, JD Hill, TI Umu-Cais, and Ta’a Malu. It is a good problem to have for the coaches that they can afford to have a top 200 player redshirt for a year to before competing for a starting job when two starting roles will be vacated by graduating seniors or NFL departures.
Overall Thoughts: After the 2026 class was signed I issued a challenge in the form of a New Year’s Resolution for the coaches. I called for Kaufusi to land a top 200 DL prospect and he answered the call. It is pretty rare for people to accomplish their resolutions by late March! Ioane is a rare prospect where the first two schools to offer him were by the same coach (first Arizona and then shortly after he arrived at UW). This is the type of recruitment that I was praising for the 2025 class and was calling for more of moving forward, being the first offer and building that relationship early. This support staff has shown a strong acumen for advanced scouting of younger players and being the first offer is something that players always remember. This is a big win for the coaching staff and hopefully one of many more to come.
Film:
