Q&A: Glenda Dawson DC Mike Garcia talks new Tech defensive line commits

In the last couple weeks Texas Tech has landed two massive EDGE rushers from the same high school, Pearland (TX) Glenda Dawson.

Charles Anderson Jr announced his decision back on June 18th, choosing the Red Raiders over a final group that included Northwestern, Nebraska and Kansas among others.

On Tuesday afternoon Eddy Smith joined his current - and now future - teammate, choosing Texas Tech over Houston, Oklahoma State and Oregon.

To learn more about what both prospects will bring to Lubbock, we caught up with Glenda Dawson defensive coordinator Mike Garcia.

"When Charles first got on campus during summer strength and conditioning camp before his freshman year, he came in and the first thing he said is that he's a receiver. We went ahead and gave him a shot, put him out there at receiver and threw him a couple balls here and there, but ultimately we moved him to tight end. We were also thinking about putting him at offensive line.

Sophomore year he ends up playing some tight end, not a whole lot, he was on varsity but he didn't play a whole lot. We were kinda going back and forth on whether he was gonna stay at the tight end position and we were returning our starter from the year before, so I was able to get him as a defensive lineman at the beginning of his junior year. That's when he started blossoming into the player he's become.

Always been a hard worker, you mentioned him being a basketball kid, he's struggled gaining weight. Even though he's a big kid he struggled gaining weight because of basketball. While he works hard and lifts weights when he's here, he's often gone to AAU basketball and during spring he's in basketball so he doesn't get to lift all the weights everybody else does and yet he's gained a lot of strength over that time. It's been fun watching him grow and become the athlete and person and player that he's become through the things that he's had to push through playing basketball."

"One of the questions I get asked by the recruiters that come through is 'if I had to pick one, which one would I pick?' and it's always hard to answer that question. The reason I say that is it depends on what you're looking for. Are you looking for a pass rusher or are you looking for someone who is gonna be more of a presence inside the box? While they're similar in size, they're two totally different kids as far as play goes.

When coach (C.J.) Ah You told me that he's looking for Eddy to be a pass rusher, and what he's looking for in Charles is to be a run stopper, then he's got them in the right spots. If you're looking for Charles to be a 'pass rush specialist', that's not necessarily his game. He hasn't played enough and he's not refined enough to be that person yet. Do I think he can become that, of course.

I also think Eddy has the ability to become the run stopper that Charles is. They both have that, I just think they have two different personalities. That's what's fun about having both of them on my team. It's easy to say hey, this is what we're trying to get done and they end up doing that."

"Obviously knowing coach McGuire's background, he's a former high school football coach in Texas, so he understands the relationship part of it. Things that we often talk about as coaches inside the building, what we would like to see from college coaches. We always talk about how it'd be nice to see these guys come in and be themselves. Not come in here and be like a big-time college coach who is just here to recruit your kid, but actually build a relationship and get to know him personally a little bit more, have a conversation. With coach McGuire and coach Ah You, those guys have come in consistently and so it gets to the point where they're asking how my day is going and how my kids are doing, it's not just 'hey coach'.

Coach Ah You, he calls me by my name, he's like 'hey coach Garcia, how's it going, how's the wife, how's the kids?'. We have conversations and it's not just 'tell me about Eddy'. Yeah, I could tell you about Eddy, but they do an amazing job of just coming in and saying this is who I am and this is how we're gonna do things.

I think coach McGuire is taking what he's heard high school coaches talk about, and probably even in his staff when he was in high school and decided this is what we need, this is what our coaches want and this is what we need to do. I think that's what he's done a good job of.

You have all these coaches coming in and building relationships with the high schools coaches, I think they're doing a great job not only with us but they're doing a heck of a job building relationships with high school kids. You have kids that wanna go there because of that. It's all about relationships. These guys are real and I think coach McGuire is doing a heck of a job with that."

"With Charles being new to the defense last year, he was a little more quiet initially. Kinda trying to fit into the role. By the end of the season everyone saw him as a leader but he was more of a 'see how I am and how I do things' vs someone who is loud and stuff like that. With Eddy, because he's been on varsity and started since his sophomore year, he had a higher voice. He's more of the verbal leader, he gets the guys motivated out loud.

You say it's nice having two Power 5 defensive ends but at the same time our nose last year, he wasn't a Power 5 kid but he was a FBS kid. So we had a hell of a d-line last year. The defensive line just set the tone throughout the season for how our defense rose."

"The first guy I would definitely talk about is our senior running back, Bryce Burgess. He's got some small offers. The crazy thing about recruiting is these college coaches, you know they have a job to do and they have a quota they have to meet, and sometimes when you have a kid that's as gifted as Bryce is they tend to overlook that with the fact that he's 5-foot-8. This kid is special. The film is there. We gotta put the film on for these coaches to see him and they enjoy it. They wanna meet him, they wanna talk to him. He comes into the room and they say 'ahh he's 5-foot-8, I can't take that back to my head coach'. I mean I get it, but look at guys like Deuce Vaughn. That guy wasn't very big and he's doing some pretty different things.

We have a kid by the name of Chase Davis, he's gonna be a junior next year. He's got a couple offers.

We have a very talented defense coming back, we have 9 of our starters from last year back. We have a kid by the name of Hudson Windsor, inside linebacker. Kids about 6-foot-2, 215-220 pounds. Just ran a 4.5 at the Louisiana Lafayette combine I think it was. He opened up some eyes. He's a kid that's gonna have some eyeballs on him this year.

Offensively I would say Jake Reynolds. Big kid, he's gonna be a junior this year. About 6-foot-4, 305 pounds. He's had to go against Charles and Eddy all spring and he's made tremendous improvements from sophomore year. I think he's gonna have a breakout season and I think he's gonna have some big-time offers after the season."