Two Bruins won’t be traveling very far from home to further their football careers.
In total, four former UCLA football players heard their names called on day three of the 2022 NFL Draft after two Bruins were selected on day two Friday. Senior defensive lineman Otito Ogbonnia and senior defensive back Quentin Lake were drafted by the Los Angeles Chargers and the Los Angeles Rams, respectively, and redshirt junior wide receiver Kyle Philips was picked by the Tennessee Titans. Redshirt senior running back Brittain Brown rounded out the class of Bruin draftees, going to the Las Vegas Raiders in the final round of the draft.
Ogbonnia went No. 160 overall and Philips No. 163 overall in the fifth round while Lake was picked at No. 211 in the sixth round and Brown No. 250 in the seventh round.
A starter in all 12 games for the Bruins a season ago, Ogbonnia was named second-team All-Pac-12 in 2021 and has been a starter since his true freshman year. Ogbonnia also competed for UCLA track and field as a freshman, participating in 13 meets in both the shot put and the discus.
The 6-foot-4, 320-pound defensive lineman filled in as the Bruins’ primary starter on the interior in 2021 after former defensive lineman Osa Odighizuwa was drafted in the third round of the 2021 NFL Draft.
Following in Odighizuwa’s footsteps, Ogbonnia is now set to join the professional ranks with a Chargers defensive line that boasts one of the top pass rushers in the NFL in defensive end Joey Bosa. Ogbonnia will also be reunited with former Bruin running back Joshua Kelley, who was selected by the Chargers in 2020.
Philips also began his UCLA career in 2018 but saw limited action in his true freshman season before blossoming into one of the Bruins’ top targets. Philips started the majority of the 30 games he saw action in across 2019 to 2021, culminating in a team-high 739 receiving yards a season ago.
The 2021 season also saw the wide receiver rank first in the Pac-12 with 10 receiving touchdowns. After four years with the blue and gold, Philips wound up fourth all-time in receptions in program history.
Set to head to the Music City, Philips will join a Titans wide receiver corps that just lost its top option after A. J. Brown was traded to the Philadelphia Eagles on day one of the draft. Shortly after, however, Tennessee used the No. 18 overall pick acquired in the trade with Philadelphia to select Arkansas wide receiver Treylon Burks.
Lake was the penultimate Bruin to hear his name called Saturday. Unlike Ogbonnia and Philips, Lake joined the program in 2017, playing as a reserve in the secondary during his true freshman campaign. The defensive back ultimately wound up as a starting safety for UCLA for four years, earning honorable mention All-America honors in his final season in 2021.
The first Bruin to be drafted by the Rams since 2004, Lake will join the defending champions and be a part of a secondary featuring one of the league’s top defensive backs in cornerback Jalen Ramsey.
With 13 picks left to go in the draft, Brown was scooped up by the Raiders. Brown spent two seasons with UCLA after transferring from Duke in 2020. Splitting action with junior running back Zach Charbonnet for much of the 2021 season, Brown amassed 615 rushing yards across the campaign, including a season-high 146 yards in a win over Arizona on Oct. 9.
The four Bruins selected on day three comes after two former UCLA players heard their names called Friday. Redshirt junior tight end Greg Dulcich and junior offensive lineman Sean Rhyan were both selected in the third round, with Dulcich going off the board at No. 80 overall to the Denver Broncos and Rhyan going to the Green Bay Packers at No. 92 overall.
The six UCLA players drafted in 2022 surpass the number of Bruins selected in the past two years combined.
