Daniels seeks redemption with Cincinnati

By Darrell Laurant  |   Friday, July 11, 2008  |  Comments( 2 )

Cincinnati Bearcats
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In a football league as apparently even as the Big East, the addition of a single weapon by one of the contending teams could be enough to tip the balance.

The University of Cincinnati might have done that with the recent addition of Alex Daniels, kicked off the University of Minnesota team after a sexual incident involving an 18-year-old female student.

Or not. At this point, the pros and cons are intriguing.

Whether UC should have given Daniels a place of refuge is not an issue to debate here (although it is certainly a worthy subject for discussion). According to police reports at the time, one of Daniels' teammates had sex with the woman after she had passed out from drinking, and Daniels filmed the incident on his cell phone. Daniels was never charged with a crime, but he and three teammates were kicked off the Gopher team.

In 2007, Daniels transferred to Raymond Walters College, a branch of the UC campus, where he apparently made good grades and kept his nose clean.

"Alex's opportunity to play at UC is based on what he has done for the past nine or 10 months," said Cincinnati coach Brian Kelly. "What he's done in the classroom and his conduct in the community has proven that he deserves another chance."

That answers one question, at least for now, but two remain. Will Daniels be healthy enough to be a factor this fall, and what will Kelly decide to do with him?

The first thought (hence the "balance-tipping" theory) is that Daniels -- who rushed for 155 yards and scored three touchdowns in one game for Minnesota -- could help fill the void left by the graduation of UC's top three running backs from 2007.

Two problems crop up, though. Now at 6-foot-4 and 255 pounds, Daniels may have eaten his way out of that position. Minnesota used him as a linebacker during his sophomore season in 2006, and there is talk that Kelly will try him at defensive end. Also, there's the question of a ruptured Achilles tendon that required surgery in March.

Yet Daniels was rated the 11th-best athlete in the country coming out of Brookhaven High School in Columbus. And if none of the new Bearcat backs demonstrate the ability to mash into the end zone from close range, Daniels may look even more intriguing.
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