Golson aims to make most of second chance
TALLAHASSEE — Everett Golson knew he was in for a long night as he picked himself off the ground.
The first play of the Class AAA 2010 state championship in South Carolina started with Rock Hill (S.C.) South Pointe High defensive end Jadeveon Clowney, an athlete some pundits considered as the most polished high school prospect to come around in decades, effortlessly shedding aside two helpless blockers as he made his way to Golson.
Often teased by his teammates at Myrtle Beach (S.C.) for his lack of mobility, Golson tried scrambling to his left, but the quarterback couldn’t escape Clowney, who grabbed Golson by his shoulder pads and flung him to the turf.
“The moment it happened, you could hear everyone in the stands… there’s this big gasp,” said Donte Sumpter, who was a wide receiver with Golson at Myrtle Beach. “We’re all looking around, wondering how we’re going to stop Clowney… but you could see in [Golson’s] eyes, this look that ‘we’re winning this game.’”
Golson, who made a major career move from Notre Dame to Florida State this offseason, didn’t play his best high school football game against Clowney. Far from it. But he withstood constant harassment from Clowney — the eventual No. 1 overall pick of the 2014 NFL draft — to throw what proved to be the game-winning touchdown pass in the fourth quarter of a 27-23 victory.
For those who saw him play regularly in South Carolina, this was vintage Golson. When the pressure was on, Golson was often at his best. That view of Golson has not held up on a national level, however. Golson, who came to FSU from Notre Dame in May as a graduate transfer eligible to play immediately for the Seminoles, is better known for his shortcomings on and off the field from his time in South Bend.
With one year of eligibility remaining and the hopes of making it to the NFL, Golson chose FSU because he feels the program has the proper tools to help him erase this perception.
Failing
It is difficult to pinpoint what went wrong for Golson at Notre Dame.
For a while, he was the golden boy, much like he was in Myrtle Beach. Golson had given Notre Dame’s offense just enough juice as a redshirt freshman to complement a top-tier defense as the Fighting Irish made it to the 2013 BCS National Championship, only to be humiliated by Alabama 42-14.
The expectation was for Golson to build on that sea- son and become a building block in coach Brian Kelly’s quarterback-friendly spread offense. However, his career went off track after he was dismissed from Notre Dame after cheating on a test.
FSU has denied requests to interview Golson, who has been in Tallahassee since the beginning of June.
He missed all of the 2013 season, but as he has throughout his career, rebounded the next season after being readmitted into Notre Dame. Golson garnered Heisman buzz as the Fighting Irish climbed to a top-five ranking and he put together several memorable performances, including one in a 31-27 loss to FSU.
Following the defeat, Notre Dame and Golson imploded. He threw 10 touchdowns to eight interceptions in November and finished the season with 12 fumbles. Kelly lost confidence in his starter and eventually replaced him with Malik Zaire
Kelly was often seen berating Golson on the sideline last season and was hyper critical of him at times in front of the media, especially after a six-turnover performance against Arizona State that essentially ended Notre Dame’s chance at earning a spot in the College Football Playoffs.
Golson threw for 446 yards in the 34-31 defeat but was sacked seven times and had several costly miscues. During the post-game press conference, a reporter asked Kelly about Golson’s turnovers but qualified the question by saying “I know [all the turnovers] are not on Golson.”
“Why are they not on Golson,” Kelly asked before being reminded of a dropped pass that led to a pick-six and a fumble that was caused by a missed blocking assignment. “We’ve been working with him [on turnovers]. Sooner or later he has to take it on himself to take care of the football. I don’t know what else to do.”
Golson had faced adversity and had failed before, but for the first time in his career, his support system was nonexistent.
A final chance
FSU represented not just a fresh start for Golson, but his best shot at making it to the NFL.
The last three starters at FSU — Christian Ponder, EJ Manuel and Jameis Winston — were all selected in the first round of the NFL draft, marking the first time a program has ever achieved such a feat. Jimbo Fisher is pulling the strings in this successful sequence, molding Ponder from a middling prospect to a first rounder as an offensive coordinator and then kept blue-chippers Manuel and Winston on the fast track to the top of the draft, with Winston recently becoming the first FSU player to be taken No. 1 overall.
So FSU became Golson’s first stop when he decided to search for new options in May.
“Once he had contact and came down to visit, we got a feel for him and how he was personally, what he wanted, what his goals and aspirations were,” Fisher said during a radio interview. “And he was for us, what our situations were, what we have, and it was very, very similar.”
Golson, according to various reports, also visited Florida and was supposed to take a look at Georgia, although that was never confirmed.
But Fisher’s track record ultimately was too good for Golson to pass on.
“He’ll have a chance to go in there, be in that same system [as other first rounders], and hopefully put himself in a better situation down the road from an NFL standpoint,” said Mickey Wilson, Golson’s former high school coach. “What he likes is that Jimbo Fisher is a ‘real guy.’ He’s really going to push him, he’s really going to get after it.”
Wilson doesn’t deny that coming to FSU is a risk for Golson, who will be eligible to play immediately as a graduate transfer. After all, there is no guarantee that he will earn the starting job over junior Sean Maguire, who is believed to be the front-runner for the job, or a bevy of other untested freshmen.
Golson, according to Wilson, is OK with that. He just wants a chance to show he can bounce back.
“Everett didn’t want to go into a situation where something was going to be handed to him,” Wilson said. “One of the greatest traits Everett has as an athlete is he’s a competitor. He wants to compete no matter how bad it is. … He’ll embrace that competition, he’ll enjoy it and I think he’ll do tremendous things at FSU.”