Football has been a family affair for Cruz Temple. Temple started playing the game at age seven, following in the footsteps of his father and older brother. His dad, Tony, was a walk-on player at the University of South Carolina and is now an assistant coach at Cruz’s high school in Abbeville, South Carolina. Brother Nate was a Shrine Bowl All-Star game participant at … [Read more...]

Pre-existing relationships have become even more important in the pandemic world of college football recruiting in which virtual campus tours and Zoom interviews have become the norm. The ability of Mike Houston’s East Carolina staff to establish a solid pre-pandemic relationship at Lakewood High School in Sumter, SC, wound up earning the Pirates their second verbal … [Read more...]

From a negative came a positive for Jason Shuford and East Carolina’s football program. Shuford, a defensive lineman from Statesville (NC) High School, had settled on continuing his football career at national junior college powerhouse Independence Community College in Kansas after falling just shy of NCAA academic requirements that would have earned him a scholarship to a … [Read more...]

Tim Shramek still considers it one of the best high school football games he’s witnessed. And that’s saying a lot for a guy who’s been a prep coach in Mississippi for almost 30 years, including the past nine as the head man at Germantown High in Madison. Shramek’s Germantown squad was facing off against Oxford in the state 5-A semifinals on November 20, 2015, in Oxford. The … [Read more...]

Tom Crowell has been a high school football coach in Montgomery County, Maryland, for most of the past five decades. During that span, Crowell has helped develop some special football talents, including current National Football League players such as receiver Stefon Diggs of the Buffalo Bills and Washington Redskins’ cornerback Kendall Fuller. Now the head coach at Sherwood … [Read more...]