Player Dossier

2019-2025

UConn

Ben Smiley

DL • 6'4" • 245 lbs • Norfolk, VA, USA

Ball-hunting defenderSplash play profile

Ben Smiley shows a ball-hunting defender profile with 18.2 disruption score.

Usage / Role

18%

Rotational defensive role

lowfeatured

Impact Production

40

Developing production for a defensive lineman

lowelite

Reliability

38

Sporadic game-to-game production

lowhigh

Star Power

42

Limited ceiling signals so far

limitedstar

Career Arc

Value trend by season

Best season by Season Value: 2024 Regular Season · Virginia

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Snapshot

Career Teams
2
Unique Seasons
7
Program Path
Virginia • UConn
Peak Game
Peak game by takeover score: Richmond

Player Story

Ben Smiley built his college career from 2019 through 2025 as a defensive lineman from Norfolk, VA wearing No. 1, spending time with UConn and Virginia. The clearest part of Ben Smiley's career was his defensive...

Read the story

Ben Smiley, DL. Best season Best season by Season Value: 2024 Regular Season · Virginia. Ben Smiley shows a ball-hunting defender profile with 18.2 disruption score.

Stat Footprint

Career production snapshot

Tackles
71
TFL
9
Sacks
4
QB hurries
12
Passes defended
1

Quick Answers

Ben Smiley quick answers

Latest team and position
UConn · DL
Career Tackles
71
Tracked sample
7 unique seasons · 7 entries · 38 games
Best season
2024 Regular Season · Virginia
Top game
Richmond
High school pipeline
Lawrence North · 15 FBS recruits · 1 drafted player
Latest roster
No. 1 · Senior
2025 Tackles rank
21 tackles · DL 327th (top 31%) · FBS Independents 30th (top 33%) · National 1,944th (top 32%)

Season Ledger

Crawlable season-by-season stats

SeasonTeamGamesTacklesTFLSacksQB HurPDTDOverall
2019 Regular SeasonVirginia23-0--038.4
2020 Regular SeasonVirginia00-0--0-
2021 Regular SeasonVirginia57-03-033
2022 Regular SeasonVirginia8131.51.5--018.6
2023 Regular SeasonVirginia7153.5211056.9
2024 Regular SeasonVirginia91220.56-059.4
2025 Regular SeasonUConn721202-041.3

Related Context

Ben Smiley played DL for Virginia and UConn. Across 7 tracked seasons, Ben Smiley recorded 71 tackles. His top tracked season came in 2025 with UConn.

Player insights

Lead takeaway

Best season by value score: 2024 Regular Season

Virginia paired 8.5 primary output with 15 efficiency.

Supporting note

2025 Regular Season role shape

impact-led usage with 18.2 efficiency.

Supporting note

Career value cooled off

2025 Regular Season fell back from the prior stop by season value score.

Supporting note

Multi-stop career journey

Production spans 2 team stops, with role shifts visible across Virginia, UConn.

Supporting note

Peak game by takeover score: Florida Atlantic

Win with 1.5 impact plays across the defensive snap sheet. It landed in the 100th percentile of the selected season.

Analysis workspace

Season Workbench

Filter the strongest season sample, inspect game-level shape, and then drop into the full log without losing the story of the year.

Season Explorer

Understand the selected season before dropping into the full game log.

2025 Regular Season · UConn

Games

7

Havoc Plays / G

0.6

Efficiency

18.2

Usage

5.1

Consistency

57.4

Best Game by takeover score

Florida Atlantic

Hover a point or expand a game row to keep the active game context visible here.

Active game

Hover over a point

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Game-by-Game Trend

Follow how the selected stat changes from one game to the next. Spikes mark standout outings, while dips show quieter weeks.

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Chronological game order.

Game by game trend chart. Central Connecticut: 0.5. Syracuse: 0.5. Ball State: 0. Buffalo: 0. Florida International: 1. Air Force: 0.5. Florida Atlantic: 1.5

Volume vs Efficiency

Each dot is a game. Farther right means the player carried more of the workload, and higher means they were more efficient with those chances.

Low volumeHigh quality

High volumeHigh quality

Low volumeLower quality

High volumeLower quality

Volume on the x-axis, quality on the y-axis.

Volume versus efficiency scatter chart. Central Connecticut: 2 by 13.3. Syracuse: 3 by 17.5. Ball State: 4 by 16.7. Buffalo: 4 by 16.7. Florida International: 3 by 22.5. Air Force: 2 by 13.3. Florida Atlantic: 3 by 27.5

Split Comparison

Compare how this player performed across different situations. "Games" shows how many matchups are included in each split.

Wins0.6 · Games = 6 · +0.1 vs Losses
Losses0.5 · Games = 1 · -0.1 vs Wins

Game Log

Dense stat lines with inline explanations and season-linked highlights.

7 games

Featured metric

Havoc Plays

Top game by takeover score

Florida Atlantic

Best efficiency game

27.5 vs Florida Atlantic

Result
Sat 11/22@ Florida AtlanticW 48-45310.5000
Sat 11/15vs Air ForceW 26-16210.5000
Sat 10/4vs Florida InternationalW 51-1031000
Sat 9/27@ BuffaloW 20-1741000
Sat 9/20vs Ball StateW 31-2541000
Sat 9/6@ SyracuseL 20-27310.5000
Sat 8/30vs Central ConnecticutW 59-13210.5000

Player Story

Ben Smiley story

Ben Smiley built his college career from 2019 through 2025 as a defensive lineman from Norfolk, VA wearing No. 1, spending time with UConn and Virginia. The clearest part of Ben Smiley's career was his defensive production: 71 tackles, 9 tackles for loss, 4 sacks, and 1 pass defended across 38 career games in the available record. That gives Ben Smiley's career enough real context without stretching the story beyond the available production.

Career Arc

Track team changes, role shifts, and season-to-season movement.

  1. 1

    Virginia

    2019-2024

    Opening stop

  2. 2

    UConn

    2025

    Final stop

Season Value Progression

2019202020212022202320242025
SeasonTeamPrimaryEfficiencyUsageDelta
2019 Regular SeasonVirginia06.31.1
2020 Regular SeasonVirginia00
2021 Regular SeasonVirginia311.833
2022 Regular SeasonVirginia310.52.50
2023 Regular SeasonVirginia7.519.66.34.5
2024 Regular SeasonVirginia8.5157.31
2025 Regular SeasonUConn418.25.1-4.5

Signature Performances

Top Games

#1 Featured game

vs Richmond

Week 1 · W 34-13

Win with 2 impact plays across the defensive snap sheet.

2

Havoc Plays

78.9 takeover

2 disruption/tackle impact with 78.9 takeover score.

#2

@ Clemson

Week 8 · L 31-48 · Conference game

2

Havoc Plays

74.7 takeover

Loss with 2 impact plays across the defensive snap sheet.

2 disruption/tackle impact with 74.7 takeover score.

#3

vs Georgia Tech

Week 10 · L 17-45 · Conference game

2

Havoc Plays

74.2 takeover

Loss with 2 impact plays across the defensive snap sheet.

2 disruption/tackle impact with 74.2 takeover score.

#4

@ North Carolina

Week 8 · W 31-27 · Conference game

2

Havoc Plays

73 takeover

Win with 2 impact plays across the defensive snap sheet.

2 disruption/tackle impact with 73 takeover score.

#5

@ No. 98 Florida Atlantic

Week 13 · W 48-45

1.5

Havoc Plays

68.6 takeover

Win with 1.5 impact plays across the defensive snap sheet.

1.5 disruption/tackle impact with 68.6 takeover score.

Top Seasons

#1 Season by Season Value

2024 Regular Season · Virginia

8.5 primary output · 15 efficiency · 7.3 usage

59.4

#2

2023 Regular Season · Virginia

56.9

7.5 primary · 19.6 efficiency · 6.3 usage

#3

2025 Regular Season · UConn

41.3

4 primary · 18.2 efficiency · 5.1 usage

Milestones

6

Impact games

5

Splash games

0

10+ tackle games