6 Fascinating Facts About Jaguars' Rayuan Lane III

Rayuan Lane is more than a fit in the Jacksonville secondary. He’ll fit right into the military-heavy Jacksonville community as a member of the armed forces. But there’s much more to the rookie’s story than his graduation this past weekend from the Naval Academy.

Lane, the Jaguars’ sixth-round selection (200th overall), was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps reserves upon his graduation Friday. A four-year starter at Navy, he majored in quantitative economics. The first Navy player invited to the scouting combine since 2019, he was the first defensive back ever drafted from the program.

Here are six other fascinating facts about Lane.

He finished his career having started 43 consecutive games and, according to his coaches, never even missed a practice.

He missed practice as a sophomore in high school, however. In fact, he voluntarily didn’t play the full football season at Gilman, an all-boys school in Baltimore, because he believed his future was in basketball. But he returned to the gridiron his junior season and never looked back.

Missing that sophomore season may have impacted Lane’s exposure. While Navy saw his potential, the Midshipmen were the only Football Bowl Subdivision to offer him. With zero stars next to his name, he enrolled in Annapolis.

Despite that lack of attention, he earned a spot in the starting lineup as a true freshman. And while he didn’t have a lot of game tape out of high school, he had plenty of dynamite plays out of college. NFL scouts especially marveled at his ability on special teams, where he served as a gunner on coverage units. That trait should not only guarantee his role on the active gameday roster for the Jaguars, it also might indirectly get him game snaps on defense.

Lane actually entered the transfer portal in the spring prior to his junior season at Navy. Lane Kiffin and Marcus Freeman welcomed him to their offices on visits, but Lane decided to return to Navy. There were no hard feelings from either party, his Navy coaches or himself.

He comes from a dynamic athletic family. Lane’s mom, Felecia, played softball at Kent State. His brother, Dejuan, is a safety at Penn State who played 16 games as a true freshman last season.

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