To say that East Carolina has established a recruiting base in the Tri-City area of Virginia would be an understatement. The stretch along the Interstate 95 corridor that runs from Richmond to Petersburg has produced current Pirates such as redshirt freshman defensive back Jonathan Coleman II, sophomore defensive lineman Rick D'Abreu, redshirt freshman defensive lineman … [Read more...]

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...]