Oct. 20, 2008

By Mike Kays , Phoenix Sports Editor

Some athletes dream of a college scholarship. Big dreams involve major college scholarships.

Erik Walden’s football-playing dream was different, his goals specific.

Quarterback or bust.

He got a taste of both.

Walden, named as the NAIA National Offensive Player of the Week last week after totaling 536 offensive yards in Bacone’s 31-30 win over Southern Nazarene, found some of the accolades he envisioned growing up in Thomasville, Ga., where major college scouts had him on their radar from the ninth grade. He was also on the radar of a book, “Signing Day” written by Corey Clark and Ira Schoffel. Clark, an Atlanta-based writer and Schoffel, who plies his trade in Tallahassee, Fla., included Walden as one of their four high-profile athletes.

Walden was hotly recruited by Georgia coach Mark Richt while playing at Thomas County Central High School, where he had a record-setting career behind center. But Walden never really felt he was recruited as a quarterback. Carson-Newman, a NCAA Division II powerhouse in Jefferson City, Tenn., was trying to get a foot in the door. In a conversation cited in “Signing Day,” Richt told Ken Sparks, the Carson-Newman coach, that the Bulldogs were looking at Walden as a defensive back or receiver. Naturally, that information got to Walden.

“If you’re an athlete, there’s always the tendency to talk you into a cornerback spot or receiver,” Walden said. “That wasn’t where my heart was. I hadn’t played defense. My middle school coach put me back at deep safety on the last play of the game in prevent situations, you know, but you never hit anyone then.

“But I remember sitting there, talking to who I thought was one of the best coaches in college football and I don’t want to take anything away from him, but he thought I could play something else. I wasn’t buying.”

Academic qualifying also would play a role with ending the dance with the Southeastern Conference power and Walden wound up at Gulf Coast (Miss.) Community College. As a freshman, he started at quarterback and the team was 3-1 when he fractured his shoulder joint. He returned the following year and led Gulf Coast to a junior college state championship, finishing second in the nation among junior colleges in all-purpose yards.

Carson-Newman came calling again but wanted him at defensive back. The quarterback opportunity had passed. Walden wound up transferring to a Division I-AA (now called Football Championship Subdivision) power, Valdosta State. He could move no further up the depth chart than the No. 3 spot at quarterback and because of that, the staff was trying to turn him toward safety or outside linebacker. Disenchanted, Walden left the program and wound up out without both his quarterback dream and a college education.

Enter Bacone coach Joe Thrasher, who happened to have played at Gulf Coast. One of Thrasher’s recruits to Bacone, offensive lineman Leslie George, helped Thrasher network the area for diamonds in the rough. George and the Gulf Coast coach, Steve Campbell, knew of a former quarterback who was working at a railroad yard back in Thomasville.

“Campbell told me he knows how to win ball games,” Thrasher said of Walden. “I saw him on film but I remember seeing him the first time I saw him in person was when I picked him up at the bus station here to sign him. He was scrawny. But I had seen what he had done on film so as long as he was the same kid, I knew what we were getting.”

Away from the game

“Before I met [coach Thrasher], I hadn’t seen a football field for two years,” Walden said. “Without him and my boy Les, this wouldn’t have been possible but it was still hard. Before, everywhere I had gone, I’d stayed close to Thomasville. This was Oklahoma, another world for me. I had a daughter at home who I’m close to and wanted to stay that way. But I realized that this was probably the best chance I had to get back in the game if I ever was. And I pretty much realized I didn’t want to keep doing what I was doing the rest of my life and that would also have an impact on my daughter.”

Bacone doesn’t offer full scholarships. Walden, like most Warriors, had to put together a package of student loans and other aid. But it had to be. The dream window had narrowed.

Said Thrasher: “We talked about life, the opportunity for an education and the chance to grow as a man. I told him how he needed to not let football use him, to use it for an education. I knew how bad he wanted to play quarterback and I’d seen the talent to be an exceptional quarterback, even the opportunity to perhaps play at the next level.

“But I urged him not to hang his hat on that either because it can be taken from you quickly in so many ways. He’d found some of those out. You have to have something else to hang your hat on and I told him he needed to do this for the sake of his daughter.”

Enrollment snags — he still owed tuition money at Valdosta State — didn’t get Walden on board until after the start of the season. Thrasher had considered red-shirting him until bringing him off the bench against Peru State three weeks ago. In that game, he engineered the game-winning drive.

That effort moved him past Jose Del Rio as the Warriors’ starter and the performance against Southern Nazarene the following week sealed it.

“We’ve installed two new packages with him, added some misdirection and included an empty backfield set just to give him some room to move around in the box,” Thrasher said. “You hear the word moxie and he’s got it in terms of the way he handles himself on the field. He’s got good leadership and the guys respond to that. Del Rio has had a good attitude about it. He wants to be out there but at the same time, he’s been supportive of Erik and wants what’s best for the team.”

Making an impression

Walden knows the impression he’s made, but isn’t taking anything for granted.

“We’ve got three guys on the team who want to be where I am,” he said. “The way I look at it, it’s a competition every day. May the best man win. If someone beats me out at some point and it’s good for the team, then I can accept that.”

He might even be a little more open to playing something other than quarterback. Thrasher believes that scouts who are hovering around the Warriors’ program to look at senior lineman Dominique Bacon will catch a glimpse of another prospect.

“He hates this but we’ve talked some about wide receiver. He knows that side very well and he knows how to read defenses,” Thrasher said.

“I don’t want to shoot that dream down but you look at a kid like Matt Jones from Arkansas who has made a pretty good career early on in the NFL as a receiver after playing quarterback and could possibly play there if a need arise. I’ve heard Jones in interviews talking about how you can adjust to the position because he understood that when I see this zone, I know where it’s going to be open or it it’s man, how the quarterbacks are going to read it. It’s a chance to broaden himself and enhance his chances of reaching that level.”