New Indiana Commit Mike McGinnis Talks With Hoosier Huddle About His Decision to Join the Hoosiers

Mike McGinnis and linebackers coach William Inge will be spending a lot more time together in Bloomington. Image: Twitter.com

Written By David Sugarman (@David_Sugarman2)

It’s been a process to say the least for Indiana to get to the point of heading to consecutive bowl games. Success hasn’t come easy or quickly, but IU is starting to see their hard work come to fruition. That’s something new commit Mike McGinnis can appreciate saying, “I’ve learned I am a simple kid who loves to just grind. I love the process of building myself to my fullest potential.”

Indiana would love to see their newest linebacker reach that potential right alongside the rest of the program especially considering Marcus Oliver and Tegray Scales, who both recently earned All-Big Ten honors, honorable mention and second team respectively, are both headed into their last year of eligibility and that’s if they choose to stay at school. If those two left school today, Indiana would lose two linebackers who have made a number of big plays over the past few seasons. Oliver holds the program record for career forced fumbles with 12 and Scales has nearly doubled his production from a year ago going from 64 to 116 tackles with the bowl game still to play. 

For many recruits that commit to play for Indiana on the defensive side of the ball, learning the nontraditional 4-2-5 defense is an adjustment. That won’t be the case for McGinnis. The three-star junior college transfer told Hoosier Huddle that he’s played in a 4-2-5 scheme each of the last two seasons at ASA College in Brooklyn, N.Y. and has had success despite having different head coaches each year. McGinnis was able to rack up more than 100 tackles in two years including 23 for loss and four sacks. While he may be getting ready to play for yet another head coach in Tom Allen it will not be, the Allentown, New Jersey natives first crack at a Division I program. McGinnis walked on at Miami before making the move down to the JUCO level. 

A self described instinctual linebacker who can "diagnose offensive plays and tendencies", McGinnis should be able to crack the two-deep for the Hoosiers. It is difficult to tell right now how much of the field McGinnis will see next season, usually coaches do not bring in JUCO transfers to ride the bench as they have a limited time in the program. However, he should provide some solid depth. He is "very excited to sit down and get to work with Coach Inge and Coach Allen and learn more about the defense and the schemes involved in it."

With another grueling schedule in the Big Ten East ahead of the Hoosiers in 2017, being able to go deep into the depth chart is always going to be vital. Not to mention there will almost certainly be starting spots to compete for headed into 2018. As Tom Allen begins to put his personal stamp on the program, McGinnis may not be the biggest name on opening night next season, but he will be an important name to know as we head deeper into the Tom Allen era.