Three from Adrian's first NSU class proud of accomplishments

NORFOLK

Pete Adrian needed players. Quickly. He was hired as Norfolk State's football coach Jan. 19, 2005, and national signing day was about two weeks away.

Adrian had no staff and no idea where even the nearest high school was located. He managed to cobble together a seven-player class on signing day and added a half-dozen more recruits before practice started.

Those players signed with a program that had gone 2-19 the previous two years. Many of them played immediately. They had to.

"If they could walk and chew gum, they were going to play," Adrian said this week.

Five years later, just three of them remain. Safety Josh Anderson, cornerback Dustin Johnson and guard Jerome Johnson are the last members of Adrian's first recruiting class. They'll play their final game today at Dick Price Stadium against Winston-Salem State.

All three are starters, and all are local - Anderson from Chesapeake, Jerome Johnson from Portsmouth and Dustin Johnson from Hampton. All are on track to graduate. They've been part of a team that contended for a MEAC title in 2007 and, with a victory today, can finish with 20 wins over the last three years, the second-most in the conference.

As they close out their careers, here are some of their reflections, in their own words:

 ____

First Impressions

D. Johnson "My senior year, Norfolk State, I would kind of hear that name and laugh. I was recruited by a lot of bigger universities. Norfolk State, we knew their program wasn't close-knit and wasn't coming up, so it was kind of a scary thought. I knew they had a new coaching staff, though, and a lot of times, change is good. Coach Adrian was a genuine man from day one, and you could tell he really loved the game and wanted to make this program and this community a lot more proud than what it's been."

J. Johnson "Most of the big-name schools recruiting me pulled out after I didn't have the SAT score. I just knew Norfolk State was local; I didn't know too much about the program. Coach A is a good talker, he knows how to persuade you, and I felt with my heart that he was going to turn this program around."

Anderson "My brother (Roy) played here. When my grades didn't pan out, I had an option to go somewhere else and walk on or come here. I had high aspirations to go to other schools, and when I first got here, I actually thought about transferring. But I prayed about it and God told me to stay."

 ____

Turning it around

D. Johnson "The first game, we got blown out. We had a lot of guys with a lot of potential, but it wasn't jelled together, and they exposed us early. We weren't prepared, and it showed. But after that game, things changed. We kind of went on a losing streak but every game was closer. We started rolling towards the end and playing good. We knew we were young, but the guys coming back in our class, we knew we could depend on them."

J. Johnson "We knew Coach A had a vision. Anywhere you go, with a new coach, you've got to build up. It's very rare that a coach comes in and just changes the program right away."

Anderson "I just started to see things, like in '06, we started playing well and '07, we played for the MEAC championship. It just reaffirmed my decision to stay and be a part of something that was new and building."

 ____

Last game

D. Johnson "It went by unbelievably quick. It's going to be a sad day but it's going to be a good day. A lot of guys in our class that came in with us, some of them we don't even know what's going on with them. The guys who were actually dedicated and were willing to stay with the program and gave their all, I think they can look back and say that not only this program but this school changed their life."

J. Johnson "A lot of family is going to be out there, and a lot of things running through your head. Just being around your boys, you've been through a lot with them boys, and they're like family, too."

Anderson "It still feels like the first couple weeks of practice. The reality really hasn't set in that this is my last college game. It seemed like just yesterday I was on the scout team, and now I'm ready to move out of the nest."

____

Final word

J. Johnson "Coach A took a chance on me when no one else would, so I owe him a lot."

Anderson "There is a starting point, a building point, for turning things around, and that's what our class started to do. That's how we left our mark."

D. Johnson "We had a lot of wins, but of course, we wanted more. Me, I just can't stand not being on top. But absolutely, I'm proud of everything we did, because this program was really the pits if you think about it, the bottom of the barrel. All the guys nobody wanted to take a chance on and nobody wanted to deal with. But now we're all stand-up guys that built the second-most wins in our conference in three years.

"It's tough to think about, but I think at the end of the day, it was a wonderful experience."

Ed Miller, (757) 446-2372, ed.miller@pilotonline.com