We’ve reached the Top 5 of our Top 100 SEC players list and will unveil the remaining players daily leading up to opening night on Aug. 28.

3. Vernon Hargreaves, Soph., CB, Florida

Great players on bad teams are often overlooked, but that wasn’t the case last fall for Hargreaves who almost instantaneously became one of the Gators’ top players on defense en route to All-American and All-SEC honors. Hargreaves accelerated up the depth chart with natural poise before progressing into one of the SEC’s best cover corners by season’s end, starting the final 10 games as a true freshman in the league’s stingiest secondary (7th-best in the nation).

RELATED: SEC’s Top 10 Defensive Players of 2014

A member of college football’s elite when the ball’s in the air, Hargreaves is up against the opposition’s No. 1 receiver every Saturday and is Florida’s next NFL starter in the secondary, joining recent stars Joe Haden and Janoris Jenkins.

2013 statistics: 38 tackles, 3 INT
2014 projection: 51 tackles, 6 INT