West Virginia NFL Draft Profile: Keilen Dykes

By Darrell Laurant  |   Wednesday, March 26, 2008  |  Comments( 0 )

West Virginia Mountaineers
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If he played basketball, they'd call a guy like West Virginia defensive tackle Keilen Dykes a "gym rat."

Dykes will take a degree away from WVU in athletic coaching, and some day he'll make an excellent coach. Right now, though, the 6-4, 290-pounder has unfinished business with the National Football League.

It irked the Mountaineer senior when he wasn't invited to the NFL Combine. Instead of sulking, though, he threw himself into training at a dingy Huntington gym he calls "just like Rocky III" and colliding daily with Marshall lineman Doug Legursky, another Combine reject.

At WVU's Pro Day, Dykes ran a 5.0 40 and hoisted 225 pounds 33 times, better than average figures for NFL caliber players. He's now expected to go somewhere in the middle rounds.

He hopes it's to the Cleveland Browns -- growing up in Youngstown, OH, he was a huge Browns' fan (in more ways than one). But he'll happily go anywhere, just as long as they let him do what he's spent much of his life doing.

"99 percent of football fans watch the ball," he told NFL Draft Blitz, "but I watch the line play."

He can tick off a long list of NFL defensive tackles and nose guards whose technique he admires, and why.

The Mountaineers' captain last season, Dykes had 32 tackles, three sacks and four tackles for loss -- not eye-catching figures, except that he was the guy who created wreckage in the interior line and allowed the linebackers and defensive ends to take advantage. Kind of like Casey Hampton of the Pittsburgh Steelers, one of those NFL players he hopes to emulate.

Dykes needs to get a little bigger to play that role in the pros, but he points to his versatility -- experience in a variety of defensive schemes. 3-4, 4-3, it's all the same to him.

He remembers walking the halls of Chaney High School and seeing players like Jerry Olzasky and Frankie Sinkwich (a Heisman winner at Georgia) represented in the trophy case. Brad Smith of the New York Jets also prepped there.

"It's a great tradition," Dykes said. "I want to be part of it."

And it's hard to bet against him -- not for anyone who's seen "Rocky III."

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