Major Wright became the fifth Florida junior to choose to enter the 2010 NFL Draft Tuesday. The safety from Miramar joins Joe Haden, Aaron Hernandez, Maurkice Pouncey and Carlos Dunlap as juniors who will forego their final year of eligibility for a shot at professional football.
“I enjoyed my time in Gainesville, they were some of the best years of my life,” Wright said. “Beyond winning championships, I will take with me some great memories of personal friendships from my teammates and lessons learned from the coaching staff. I will always be a Gator and look forward to watching them play from the sidelines in the future.”
“Major will be missed in our secondary and by his teammates,” said head coach Urban Meyer. “He was a physical player who had a presence on the football field and was someone our players looked up to and gravitated to. They enjoyed being around him both on and off the field. We wish him the best of luck.”
In his three years at UF, Wright was part of two SEC Eastern Division-winning teams, including the 2008 National and SEC Champions. He finished his collegiate career with 165 tackles, 10 passes defended, eight interceptions, four forced fumbles and a fumble recovery in 41 games played.
This past season, the 6-foot-0, 204-pound defender tied for second on the Gators with three interceptions and registered 32 tackles, 28 of which were solo. In his final appearance for the Orange and Blue, Wright notched four tackles and broke up a pass in UF’s 51-24 victory over Cincinnati in the 2010 Allstate Sugar Bowl. He made a key pick in the
fourth quarter at Mississippi State at the one-yard line and totaled a season-high eight tackles in the SEC Championship Game.
As a sophomore, Wright started all 14 contests, tied for second on the team with four interceptions and was third with 66 total tackles. He earned honorable mention All-Sophomore recognition from College Football News. In the BCS National Championship Game against Oklahoma, Wright collected nine tackles and also picked off a pass at the goal line from
Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Sam Bradford that prevented the Sooners from scoring at the end of the first half. In the Homecoming win over Kentucky, he returned a blocked field goal 37 yards to set up a touchdown.
Wright started seven games in his freshman campaign, when he was named to the Coaches’ Freshman All-SEC team and as a Second-Team Freshman All-American by Rivals.com. In addition, he earned first-team All-American honors from CollegeFootballNews.com, was a Freshman All-American Honorable Mention from Sporting News and was selected to the SEC Freshman Academic Honor Roll. Wright ranked third on the team and first among freshmen in total tackles with 67, the fifth-highest total by any freshman in the SEC. He led the team and tied for first in the SEC in forced fumbles with four on the season, including one in back-to-back games versus Ole Miss and Auburn. No other SEC freshman was in the top 10 in that category and the four forced fumbles were the most by a Florida player since Guss Scott had five in 2003 and the most by any Florida freshman since the statistic began being kept in 1982.