Jerome Williams, a 6-foot-5, 280-pound junior offensive tackle from Osseo (MN) High, is one of the top football players in the state and has a Minnesota football offer.
GopherHole recently caught up with Williams to learn the latest on his college recruitment, his love of Minnesota and junior year.
Gopher Hole: You just picked up recent offers from Illinois and Missouri. How many offers are you up to right now?
Jerome Williams: Six. (Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa State, Kansas and West Virginia)
GopherHole: How pleased are you with your recruitment? To be honest, most kids aren’t received six offers before their senior season.
Jerome Williams: I am really proud of myself, because last year was my first year of football. It wasn’t really good. Still learning. This summer, I just knew that I wanted to work hard. I was balancing basketball and traveling football. Doing a lot of lifting. It is really good to see my growth from this year to last year.
GopherHole: If I had told you a year ago that you’d have six offers now, what would you have thought?
Jerome Williams: I didn’t think that I was going to get my first offer until after my senior season from like a mid major Division I school, maybe a D2.
GopherHole: So you wouldn’t have believed it ?
Jerome Williams: Not at all.
GopherHole: Does that make you want to work even harder to hear from even more schools?
Jerome Williams: Yes, for sure. I plan on committing before my senior season, maybe August even. I am just going to work harder, regardless, because I have always been that type of person to work hard when there is something I want. I like setting goals for myself daily that I know are going to be hard to achieve, because that is going to make me work harder.
GopherHole: I know I saw you at a Gopher football game. How many games did you get a chance to make this past year?
Jerome Williams: 4 or 5. I was at Nebraska, Bowling Green, Illinois and Wisconsin. The first game I went to was Bowling Green.
GopherHole: What was that experience like?
Jerome Williams: It was crazy. That was my first game day visit and my first part of recruiting I had experienced. I was kind of nervous. I didn’t really talk that much, because I really don’t talk that much, especially with someone I don’t know, so I was kind of nervous. I didn’t really know what to say. What not to say. How to respond, so it was weird.
GopherHole: Did you get a chance to go to any other college games?
Jerome Williams: I went to Iowa State and I think that they played Kansas. I went there on the 2nd. It was the week after the Bowling Green game. I went to NDSU and SDSU and that’s about it. I was trying to go to a couple of other places , but I couldn’t get transportation figured out.
GopherHole: Have you been to any college basketball games to check out some campuses?
Jerome Williams: Besides the U of M, I haven’t been to any other basketball games. I plan on going to Kansas Saturday, though for a basketball game.
GopherHole: I think you were invited to the Gopher Junior Day this weekend. What all are you planning on doing Sunday?
Jerome Williams: I heard that there is a Photoshoot, academic meeting, a facilities tour, but I’ve already seen it a couple of times I think we are doing some position meetings. It’s my first Junior Day.
GopherHole: When you go to these recruiting things, do you kind of get a feel for what it is going to be like to be part of a college team or is still kind of hard to picture yourself that way yet?
Jerome Williams: I already have a good idea of it, because I went to a bowl game practice and that kind of opened up my eyes, knowing that is going to be me in a year and a half.
GopherHole: What impressed you the most in the practice?
Jerome Williams: They were constantly moving. They don’t really get that much breaks. I remember the practice I went to, Coach Callahan said that they don’t do much conditioning during the season, because they are constantly moving at high speed and high pace. It is a lot of technique work, obviously for offensive lineman, A lot different from high school practice.
GopherHole: You said that you might try to decide before your senior year. What are going to be the main factors that are going to make you pick School A over School B or C?
Jerome Williams: I really don’t have a lot of criteria. I think the most important thing to me is probably the relationship that I have with the coaches. That is always a factor from what I have experienced so far with different coaches and different schools. It makes me feel strongly towards them.
GopherHole: How about your relationship with Minnesota. What’s that been like?
Jerome Williams: I talk to all the guys, all the time. Some of the schools, it’s like me and the offensive line coach. At Minnesota, I think I’ve had a conversation with everybody. I talked to a couple of recruiting coordinators, offensive line coach. I talked to Clay when he was still here. I already started talking to the new guy, the tight end coach. I talked to the defensive line coach before. I talked to Fleck all the time. I talk to them a lot.
GopherHole: If you decide to play close to home, what would that mean to you to play for the homestate school?
Jerome Williams: It would be really crazy because you know how schools feel about in state guys. If you are getting an offer from your home school, it is probably going to feel better. You get a lot more love from fans than you are going to get from an out-of-state school.