Rutgers’ Longa and Carroo Invited to NFL Scouting Combine

Former Rutgers WR Leonte Carroo will participate in the 2016 NFL Scouting Combine at the end of February in Indianapolis.

Ex-Scarlet Knights wide receiver Leonte Carroo and linebacker Steve Longa will both represent Rutgers football at the NFL Scouting Combine. The event will take place at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis from Feb. 26-29 and will be televised on NFL Network.

Last year, fullback Michael Burton and tight end Tyler Kroft both showed their talents at the combine. Kroft ended up being selected in the third round (85^th overall) of the NFL Draft by the Cincinnati Bengals and Burton went to the Detroit Lions in the fifth round (168^th overall).

Carroo, the 2015 Homer Hazel Trophy recipient, which is awarded to the Rutgers football MVP, leaves as one of the top wide receivers in school history. He left Rutgers as the school’s leader with 29 receiving touchdowns and third with 2,373 yards over 31 games. Named All-Big Ten in each of the past two seasons, he finished his time “On the Banks” with an average of 101.1 yards per game as a senior, including a career-best 183 in his final collegiate game. In addition, Carroo had three different games this past year with three touchdowns to bring his career total to 10 multiple-score games. If not for injuries and suspensions, who knows how high his stats would have been. Carroo could have been the best receiver to ever come out of the State University of New Jersey.

Longa was an All-Big Ten selection and Rutgers’ Defensive MVP after averaging 10.6 tackles per game in 2015, the second-best mark in the conference. The redshirt junior racked up 117 total stops to become the second player in school history with three seasons of at least 100 stops. Overall, he collected 342 tackles over three seasons to rank eighth in school history in the category, including 14 games of double-digit stops. Additionally, the early-entrant had seven sacks, seven pass break-ups, five forced fumbles and two fumble recoveries in college.

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Other Scarlet Knights with draft and NFL hopes are running back Paul James, linebacker Quentin Gause, fullback Sam Bergen, offensive lineman Keith Lumpkin, defensive lineman Djwany Mera, kicker Kyle Federico, and linebacker Kaiwan Lewis.