Laiatu Latu

Laiatu Latu (born December 31, 2000) is an American college football defensive end.

He played college football for the Washington Huskies before transferring to the UCLA Bruins.

With the Bruins in 2023, Latu was named a unanimous All-American and won the Ted Hendricks and Lombardi Awards in addition to several other honors.

Latu grew up in Sacramento, California, and attended Jesuit High School.

He was named first team All-California after recording 94 total tackles, 29.5 tackles for loss, and six sacks as a senior.

Latu was rated a four-star recruit and committed to play college football at Washington over offers from UCLA and USC.

Latu began his college career with the Washington Huskies.

He played in 12 games as a freshman and finished the season with 16 tackles and 1.5 tackles for loss.

Latu suffered a neck injury during fall practices entering his sophomore year.

Following the season, Washington's team doctors deemed that the injury had not recovered enough and that it would be too dangerous for Latu to continue playing football.

Huskies' head coach Jimmy Lake announced that Latu had retired at the start of spring practices in 2021.

He remained enrolled at the University of Washington for the first semester of his junior year before entering the NCAA transfer portal to find a program where he could continue his college football career.

Latu ultimately transferred to the University of California, Los Angeles.

He was cleared to play by team physicians near the end on the Bruins' spring practices.

In 2022 Latu was named the Pac-12 Conference Defensive Player of the Week for Week 4 after recording three sacks and forcing a fumble against Colorado.

He had 10.5 sacks for the season.

In 2023 Latu started all 12 games.

He led the nation in tackles for loss per game (1.8) and ranked fourth nationally in sacks per game (1.08) average.

His total of 13.0 sacks was the highest by any player in the Pac-12.

Latu was UCLA's first-ever winner of both the Lombardi Award and the Ted Hendricks Award.