Inching ever closer to the start of football season, yesterday we highlighted the career of Arizona State's last great fullback, Mike Karney. With 43 days until kickoff, our Spotlght Series shifts to the defense and outstanding lineman Davon Coleman.
Hailing from the football cradle of Ohio, Davon was a star for Glenville High School in Cleveland, earning honorable mention All-Ohio honors as a senior and contributing to his team's defeat of mighty Massilon High School, en route to becoming the first Cleveland Public school to advance to the OHSAA state final.
Not highly recruited coming out of high school, Davon went the junior college route, attending Fort Scott Community College in Fort Scott, Kansas. In his only season as a redshirt freshman in 2010, he recorded an impressive 65 tackles, including 8.5 tackles for loss, 2.5 sacks, two forced fumbles and one interception.
That performance attracted the attention of head coach Dennis Erickson, leading Coleman to transfer to Arizona State as the first signee from the state of Kansas since running back Ryan Torain (2006).
As a sophomore in 2011, Davon was a valuable part of the rotation at defensive tackle. Playing in 13 games as a backup, he recorded 42 tackles (23 solo), five tackles for loss and 2.5 sacks. That playing time would increase as a junior when he would again play in all 13 games, getting 9 starts at defensive end. He upped the ante from his sophomore season, recording 66 tackles (42 solo), including 11 tackles for loss, good for 5th on the team. His versatility continued to show with 5 sacks, and one blocked extra point.
Returning for his senior season in 2013, Davon would move back to defensive tackle, where he would start all 13 games. The hard-nosed defensive play continued, recording 58 tackles (35 solo), 15 tackles for loss, and tied for the team lead with 8.5 sacks.
In the loss to Stanford in the Pac-12 Championship Game, Coleman did everything he could to keep Kevin Hogan and the Cardinal in check, recording 7 tackles (6 solo) and one sack. His Sun Devil career would end with 166 tackles (31 for loss) and 16 sacks, starting 22 of the 39 games that he appeared in. His 66 tackles in 2012 ranked 4th for tackles by a defensive lineman in a single season since 1990 (as of 2019).
Most tackles for ASU defensive linemen since 1990:
— Jeremy Hawkes (@JeremyHawkes) December 4, 2019
Shante Carver (1993) -79@JermayneLole (2019) – 68
Jeremy Staat (1997) - 68
Davon Coleman (2012) – 66
Will Sutton (2012) – 63
Numbers get pretty skewed prior to that due to run-first nature of football at the time.
The 2014 NFL Draft came and went without Davon coming off the board, but the Dallas Cowboys signed him on May 13th as an undrafted free agent. The Cowboys battled injuries on the defensive line, pressing Coleman in to service for his first career start on September 7th against the San Francisco 49ers.
He would be on the active roster for the first two games of the season, recording three tackles in those games, before injuring his knee in a weight room accident and being ruled inactive for the next 8 games. He would be waived then re-signed to the Cowboys practice squad, appearing in two games for the Cowboys in 2015 but recording no stats.
After spending time on the practice squads of the Chicago Bears, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and New York Giants in the 2015 and 2016 seasons, Davon's NFL days came to an end. His football career was not over, as he would go on to play in the CFL from 2017-2022 for the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, BC Lions, Toronto Argonauts, and Ottawa Redblacks. In 69 games up north, Davon recorded 174 tackles, 24 sacks, three interceptions, also forcing two fumbles. His best season came with BC in 2018, when his 56 tackles, 7 sacks and two interceptions earned him both CFL West All-Star and CFL All-Star honors.
His career was not the flashiest ever, but the way Davon Coleman played with his nose to the grindstone and played with extreme versatility makes him today's pick in our Spotlight Series.