Dillard’s Nyjalik Kelly is Broward 8A-6A Football Defensive Player of the Year
The season was just getting set to begin, and Dillard’s Tyler Tate had high praise for one of his top defensive standouts.
“He’s basically unblockable,” Tate said of senior Nyjalik Kelly back in August.
That turned out to be a pretty fair assessment.
Kelly, a Miami Hurricanes signee, was dominant for a Dillard team that finished as the runner-up to eventual state champion St. Thomas Aquinas in District 14-7A and reached the regional semifinals.
As such, Kelly is the Miami Herald’s Broward 8A-6A Football Defensive Player of the Year.
“He’s one of the top players in not only the pass game, but the run game as well,” Tate said. “He does a great job of using his hands and getting skinny on the pass rush. He’s been an unbelievable player for us.”
Kelly, a four-star prospect and the No. 12 overall prospect in Florida this recruiting cycle according to 247Sports, finished the season with 58 tackles, 12 sacks and 20 tackles for loss. The 6-4, 240-pound senior was an anchor on Dillard’s defensive line and helped the team field shutouts in eight of its 12 games. He also played in the All-American Bowl.
It builds on Kelly’s junior season in which had 13 sacks, 21 tackles for loss, four forced fumbles and a pair of fumble recoveries for a Panthers team that went a perfect 6-0 and won the 6A-1A tri-county championship (Dillard, like most public schools in South Florida, did not participate in the FHSAA state series in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic).
He plays nimble for his size, using flexibility to play well off the edge and instincts to make finishing moves once he beats his blocker and gets to the backfield.
It’s a glimpse, Kelly hopes, of what he’ll be able to do as his football career continues at Miami under new coach Mario Cristobal.
“I’m going to go in with the mindset to beat everybody out so I can play and start right away,” Kelly said.
And Hurricanes fans can credit Cristobal for Kelly staying close to home. Cristobal was previously recruiting Kelly to play at Oregon. Kelly said his commitment decision became a “no-brainer” when UM hired Cristobal.
“I really fell in love with Oregon and coach Cristobal and all of them over there,” Kelly said during his signing ceremony where he picked Miami over Florida, Florida State and Georgia. “But now that he’s back in my hometown, I had to pick ‘the U.’”
And Kelly certainly feels confident that his signing class is going to help the Hurricanes “be good for a long time.” In addition to Kelly, Miami’s 2022 recruting class also includes Miami Central linebacker Wesley Bissainthe among local defensive standouts as well as fellow four-star prospects in Las Vegas Bishop Gorman edge rusher Cyrus Moss, Lexington (Mississippi) Holmes County cornerback Khamauri Rogers, Fort Myers Bishop Verot athlete Chris Graves and Orlando Evans safety Markeith Williams.
“We,” Kelly said, “are going to shock the world.”
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