To be clear, I'm not a SCUM fan, however I had to post an article about a Tiger.
Michigan offer a dream come true for Massillon's Andrew David
Todd Porter
[email protected]
Updated: Monday, June 24, 2013
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Massillon junior kicker Andrew David received a college scholarship offer from Michigan. GATEHOUSE OHIO FILE
MASSILLON There might have been a risk in waiting another year to offer Andrew David a full-ride football scholarship. Michigan head coach Brady Hoke wasn’t willing to take a chance that his biggest rival might offer one of his biggest fans first.
Monday afternoon, the Wolverines offered Massillon junior kicker Andrew David a scholarship. David, and his father Jeff, are Michigan fans and have regularly attended games in Ann Arbor since Andrew was old enough to walk.
David was going to spend Monday evening talking with his family. He and his father planned to call Hoke and accept the offer Monday evening.
“Andrew went up there and kicked in front of them a few weeks ago,” Massillon head coach Jason Hall said. “Typically, kickers don’t get offered until before their senior season. This is before Andrew’s junior season. He’s one of the best kickers in his class in the country, if not the best in the country. I know he’s a huge Michigan fan. This is a dream come true for him.”
David attended a nationally recognized kicking camp in the spring and faired extremely well. David left the Chris Sailer Kicking School in Las Vegas as one of the top three kickers in the country in the next two recruiting classes. College coaches rely heavily on camps such as Sailer’s because few recruiting staffs have intimate knowledge of kicking.
“That ranking in Chris Sailer is actually better than going to the Elite 11 quarterback camp,” scout.com recruiting analyst Bill Greene said. “When college coaches get a quarterback on campus, they know what they want in a quarterback. Coaches have no clue about kickers. They rely on guys like Sailer because they know they don’t know more about kicking prospects than Sailer does.”
David has spent most of his summer on travel baseball. When he isn’t on the diamond, he’s been to camps kicking in front of coaches.
He got out of practice Monday and was taking an ice bath when he received a text message from Hall. He wanted to speak with his kicker in his office.
“Michigan is the place I grew up loving,” David said. “They offered me for a reason. They have trust in me. It’s a dream come true, really.”
“Andrew has worked extremely hard all offseason,” Hall said. “He’s a competitor and a good baseball player, too. Right now he’s competing at quarterback for us as well.”
Michigan was David’s first official football offer. That it came from a BCS school should not be a great surprise. That it came this early is a surprise.
According to Hall, Ohio State coaches joked about how tough it would be for the Buckeyes to recruit David because of his allegiance to Michigan.
David is 6-of-11 on field goals of 40-yards the last two years of varsity football. That includes a 46-yarder as a freshman that he drilled at InfoCision Stadium in a game against Hoban. He is 88-of-95 on PATs and 13-of-24 on field goals.
He was better as a sophomore having converted 56 of 61 PAT kicks and he hit three field goals in a win against McKinley last year. He scored 13 points in that game.
As important is his booming kickoffs. Of his 74 kickoffs, 31 went for touchbacks.
“When I went up there a few weeks ago, they had me kicking off the ground, college style,” David said. “I hit from 50 yards a couple times. Then I kicked off a couple of times. They came to a couple of my better games, one was against Fitch when I had five touchbacks and a field goal. I think that I’m already kicking off the ground a year before most of the other elite kickers do it, Michigan coaches saw a lot of upside in me and room to grow and get better.”
