Official Visit Preview: JUCO safety Da'Mare Williams

Kentucky isn’t targeting many high school prospects in the lead-up to the early signing period, which begins on December 3, but the Wildcats are in hot pursuit of a number of JUCO targets.

Earlier on Sunday, Cats Illustrated previewed Iowa Central C.C. linebacker Taylor Schaefer’s official visit to Kentucky which begins on Monday. It’s also important to spotlight Da’Mare Williams, one of the top JUCO safeties available in the 2026 recruiting class. His official visit to Kentucky begins on Monday as well.

UK’s pursuit of junior college players serves a number of purposes but it’s primarily a mechanism by which the coaching staff can build up the roster with more physical maturity and game readiness than high school prospects can generally provide. And in most cases, every player taken from the JUCO ranks is one less player the Cats will need to pay for to get out of the portal.

So what does Williams bring to the table?

At 6’3, 205 pounds, he’s an imposing physical presence as a safety. He has great length and that’s something Kentucky obviously looks for in the secondary and with that size he can fulfill some of the functions of a linebacker playing in space to make Kentucky faster while he’s on the field.

Williams is a December graduate who will enroll at a new school in January. He has almost two dozen Division I offers in total and a few from the power conferences. He has used a redshirt year and has one year of JUCO action under his belt. That means Williams will have three years to complete three seasons of eligibility wherever he ends up. So if he were to pick Kentucky he would show up as basically a redshirt sophomore on next year’s roster.

Kentucky stands to lose Jordan Lovett and Jantzen Dunn from this year’s defensive backfield and we don’t know who else might leave the program from the secondary.

While some JUCO recruits might involve a reach on the part of an SEC school Williams does have other power conference offers so he has an established profile and is sought after by enough FBS coaches that he checks a lot of boxes.

West Virginia, Houston, and UCF are other schools that have offered the Coffeyville C.C. (Kan.) standout.

Williams is taking a bunch of official visits at the tail end of the recruiting process so this is a pivotal time for him. He has already taken official visits to Charlotte, UCF, and now Houston. Officials to Kentucky and West Virginia remain. Williams will take an official visit to Kentucky on Monday and Tuesday of this week. At the end of the work week he will travel to West Virginia.

Williams attended Sylva (N.C.) Smoky Mountain as a high school prospect from the Class of 2024. He was on track to sign with East Carolina as a high school recruit but that letter of intent was never processed and he detoured to the JUCO route.

What shows up on film is Williams’ physicality and aggression as an open field tackler. He breaks hard on the ball and covers ground quickly, striking the ball with force and bringing guys down in wide open 1-on-1 situations. He also has the jets to accelerate to get to the ball before a block and can step in front of a floater to take it the other way.

We don’t see a lot of man coverage against difficult receiver assignments and there’s more of a track record of good tackles near the line of scrimmage than there is in coverage. As a safety Williams seems to be in his element when he’s going downhill and going fast after the ball. It will be interesting to see how he tracks the ball in the air and fares in those tougher matchups in coverage.