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From the Bears to the Aggies
Freader will join the ranks of Oklahoma Panhandle State's crimson and blue this coming fall
BY MARC DAVID
Staff Writer
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| “He’s a high-effort kid and an over-achiever. He works his tail off and gives you everything he has on every play. Things worked out well for him.” -CHS Coach Cayle Ferguson |
The Coolidge High graduate earned high grades from everyone for his work ethic and rapid improvement on the football field. It was more than his coaches and teammates.
San Tan Foothills High second-year head football coach Rodger Schenks is an OPSU graduate and a former roommate of first-year Aggies’ coach Jon Lyles. Former coach Mike Wyatt, who guided OPSU to a 6-5 record in 2010 that was the school’s first winning season in six years, died of a heart attack in December.
Lyles was named coach in late January and was scrambling to find quality players to bring to the Goodwell campus. A town similar in size to Freader’s home turf in Coolidge. He turned to some of his friends including Schenks, who was impressed with Freader and suggested he might be a good fit.
“Tyler is a good football player with good grades, things the Aggies are looking for,” said Schenks, an All-American punter at Oklahoma Panhandle. “He’ll be able to compete there and he’ll get a good education. Any time I am able to help someone in the Coolidge Unified School District, I am happy to do so.”
Freader visited the campus in early June and decided it was a good fit.
“I was grateful for what he did,” Freader said of Schenks. “I was glad he had connections. I was thinking I would be just going (to college) as a student.”
Freader will be going as a student-athlete. The 5-10, 240-pound Freader’s career at Coolidge was marked by improvement through hard work. A center-defensive tackle, he didn’t start his sophomore year. As a junior he was voted the Bears’ Most Improved Player. As a senior on a 10-2 team, he was recipient of the Bear Pride Award as well as honorable mention all-conference at center.
“He’s a high-effort kid and an over-achiever,” Coolidge coach Cayle Ferguson said. “He works his tail off and gives you everything he has on every play. Things worked out well for him.”
Freader, an honor roll student who had 33 tackles his senior season, is attending Central Arizona College this summer where he is taking English 101 and a college introductory course. He has been working out at the high school – lifting weights, doing
plyometrics and running. He will head to Oklahoma Panhandle in August.
While the university is 732 miles from Coolidge, Freader has already spent time in Oklahoma. He has family in the Sooner State and attended a football camp in Norman. His aunt lives in Norman and maternal grandparents are in Tulsa.
“I’m a little nervous but looking forward to it,” Freader said.
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Go Bears! wrote on Jun 29, 2011 9:18 PM: