PhD Candidate, Computer Science
Kansas State University, KS, United States
Ahsan Zaidi, MS, is a PhD Candidate in Computer Science at Kansas State University, where his research focuses on computer vision and video understanding for athlete safety. His work centers on building AI systems that analyze football practice footage to detect contact events and assess tackling technique against biomechanical safety criteria. These systems are designed to provide coaches, athletic trainers, and sports medicine professionals with faster and more consistent tools for injury risk assessment.
His recent work includes GRAZE, an automated video-analysis pipeline that detects football contact events in practice footage without requiring manual frame-by-frame labeling, presented as a spotlight at CVSports at CVPR 2026. His ongoing AutoTackle project applies deep learning models to classify tackle mechanics according to the SATT rubric, a published clinical assessment tool for tackling technique with preliminary validation data. This classification work was published at ICPR 2026.
Zaidi's broader goal is to translate advances in computer vision into practical, field-ready decision-support systems that enable scalable, objective evaluation of practice footage while reducing the burden of manual review. He aims to help sports medicine professionals and coaching staff identify unsafe technique earlier, more consistently, and without disrupting existing practice workflows.
Detection & Analysis of Risky Football Tackles Using Artificial Intelligence
Friday, July 10, 2026
3:14 PM - 3:22 PM PDT
Nothing to disclose