The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Clock management
On and off the field, Xavier’s Drew Kron makes the most of his time
MIDDLETOWN — There is not a lot of time in Drew Kron’s day.
He gets up at 6:45 a.m., leaves his parents’ home in Hebron 45 minutes later and arrives at Xavier High School around 8 a.m.
The senior has a full plate of classes, including three math classes, one being Advanced Placement Statistics. School is followed by football practice and he gets home around 7:45 p.m., does homework and watches film if he has the time.
And then he breathes. “Sometimes there is a lot thrown at you and honestly football season is probably the hardest part because the practices are longer, you get home a little later,” Kron said. “Some nights are worse than others, but you have to keep the grind going.”
All Kron has known is the grind. He burst onto the football scene as the starting quarterback for the Falcons football program. He then made a name for himself on the baseball diamond, where he committed to play at UConn before his junior season. He was voted Class President this year and holds a 3.9plus GPA.
“Being someone that somebody else might look up to or follow, there is some pressure that comes with it,” Kron said. “I try to live as freely as possible.”
That cool and free attitude is something coaches and administrators noticed right away when Kron stepped on campus.
“He shows up and is ready to go to work in the classroom and is ready for practice, gets up the next day and does it again and never complains about it,” Xavier Associate Director of Advancement and offensive coordinator, Greg Jaskot said. “It speaks to his drive to be great in everything that he does.”
Being the quarterback at Xavier comes with a whole different amount of pressure. He has followed in the footsteps of Tim Boyle, who led the Falcons to three straight Class LL
titles and is a member of the Detroit Lions, and Will Levis, who is the starting quarterback for 15thranked Kentucky which has wins over Florida and LSU.
“You hope that you have several kids to have that drive to be great in everything they do,” Jaskot said. “Timmy Boyle, Will Levis, they all had that drive and Drew has that drive.”
Kron said he learned his drive at a young age.
“My family is like that,” he said. “I grew up looking up to my family and seeing that.”
As a freshman, coach Andy Guyon decided to dress Kron for the team’s season finale against Greenwich, a team that went 13-0, captured the Class LL title and the No. 1 ranking in the final GameTimeCT media poll.
With Xavier trailing 38-0 in the fourth quarter, Guyon put Kron in and let him go to work.
He led the team down the field and scored his first varsity touchdown on a 5-yard run.
“I was like ‘we got something now,’ ” Guyon said.
Kron led the Falcons to a 5-5 record as a sophomore and this season has his team in the thick of things in the Class L playoff hunt at 3-2.
Last week in a must-win game against Cheshire, Kron scored twice including the game-tying run, and led the Falcons down the field to set up a DJ Wright touchdown run to give Xavier the lead for good.
“He’s got that ‘it’ factor of when it’s time to step up and make a play, he knows how to do it,” Guyon said. “He might not be the best passer, he might not be the best runner, he may not be the biggest and most physical kid, but when the play needs to be made, he makes it.”
This will probably be Kron’s final season playing football, with a spot on Jim Penders’ UConn baseball team awaiting him next fall.
“He took in everything Xavier had to offer and used it to his advantage,” Guyon said. “Whether it was social, academic or athletics. He took Xavier in and did the best he could to experience everything we have here.”