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Northern Illinois is on a roll and putting themselves in position to move up in our MAC Recruiting Power Rankings. With the commitment of offensive guard Nathan Veloz, that gives the Huskies their third commitment in just over a week. Veloz announced his commitment via his Twitter on Sunday.
Nathan Veloz attends Oak Creek High School located in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. At 6-foot-4 310 pounds, Veloz is tough guy to get by and has the ability to put defensive linemen on their backs consistently.
Nathan Veloz
Oak Creek, WI
Status: Verbally committed to Northern Illinois
Commitment Date: 8/3/2014
Height: 6'4"
Weight: 310
Position(s): OG
High School: Oak Creek
Veloz is rated 3-stars by both 247Sports and Rivals.com. Both services rate him as the fourth best recruit in Wisconsin for the class of 2015. Veloz chose the Huskies over offers from Buffalo and Western Michigan. Veloz also was garnering interest from B1G schools such as Iowa, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern, and Wisconsin.
This a huge get for the Huskies as they will be losing quite a few offensive linemen after this year. Once Veloz steps on campus he could be in the mix to get some immediate playing time if he is able to impress in Fall camp. However, history tells us that it might be more likely that Veloz gets redshirted like most linemen that enroll at NIU. Offensive lineman Scott Taylor, NIU's highest rated recruit from 2012, redshirted his freshman year, however the NIU staff is expecting big things from him during his next few years on campus. It will definitely be interesting to see what the staff at Northern Illinois does with the talented Nathan Veloz his first year as a Huskie.
Veloz is not the only highly touted offensive linemen to choose the Huskies as 3-star tackle Vincent Hughes committed to the Huskies in June. Hughes is also from Wisconsin so it is clear that the Huskies staff likes to head north to find their offensive linemen. This is also the fourth recruit from the state of Wisconsin to verbally commit to the Huskies.
Overall, Huskie fans have reason to be excited about the future of the offensive line with Hughes and Veloz being a huge part of the future.
Check out Nathan Veloz's impressive Hudl highlights below: