The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Multi-talented Richards ready for last run
Perry standout among Ohio’s best athletes in three sports
The sun had barely began to crest the eastern skies when Brayden Richards and his buddies — who hadn’t been to bed yet — decided to get in an early round of golf.
Just a handful of weeks had passed since Richards, a junior at Perry, won a Division II state championship in the 300 hurdles to go with the third-place finish he garnered in the pole vault.
Richards was probably still a little bit sore from his trip to North Carolina where he won an AAU national title in the decathlon, yet he and his friends were going to hit 18 at nearby Erie Shores Golf Course.
He carded a round of 84 to go with the nine-hole round of 41 he shot a day earlier at Little Mountain Country Club.
And he’s not even a member of the Perry golf team. He just plays for the fun of it.
When the Perry football team hits the field for an Aug. 18 season opener against visiting Madison, it will do so with one of the most dynamic multi-sport athletes to come through The News-Herald coverage area in quite some time.
Not only is Richards one of the area’s — if not the nation’s — best track and field athletes, but he was also a special mention Division III All-Ohioan in basketball. This fall he’ll star on the gridiron for the Pirates after a junior year in which he earned first-team Division V All-Ohio honors with a skill set that allowed him to accumulate 2,042 yards offense, 25 touchdowns and five two-point conversions.
“For one, what makes him unique is the diversity of his skill set,” football coach Bob Gecewich said. “In track, he’s a decathlete, not someone who just does one or two events. In football, we have the flexibility of moving him around from receiver to running back to quarterback or wherever.
“I think it’s his competitive nature. Whatever he does, he wants to succeed at it.”
Richards’ will to compete — and be good at it — can be tracked back to when he was 3- or 4-years old when he was at the track with his father Layne, the head coach of the Perry track and field team. Off to the
side lay a broken pole that couldn’t be used for the pole vault anymore.
Young Brayden picked it up and gave it a shot.
“I got like 5 feet or something,” Richards remembers.
A few years later as a kindergartener, Richards was playing on a team with FOURTH GRADERS in Perry’s Freeway League team and caught his first
pass from future Perry AllOhioan Drew Schiano for a 10-yard gain. It was his first “big play” on the gridiron.
The trend hasn’t stopped since. Whatever Richards has done competitively, he’s done at a high level.
“I like competing,” Richards said with a broad smile. “I like winning. It’s fun.
“Having success is fun, but without struggles or
mistakes, you don’t grow. I think those struggles are where a lot of my success comes from. (Non-success) definitely drives me.”
On the basketball court, Richards averaged 16.2 points per game for the Pirates to go with 6.8 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game. He’d likely be a college basketball prospect if he chose to go that route.
Instead, his college ticket will be in track and field. He won a state championship in the 300 hurdles with a time of 37.61. He missed out on a double-up in the pole vault, placing third with a vault of 15 feet, 8 inches.
His performance in Greensboro, N.C. at the adidas AAU Nationals was impressive, his score of 7,042 points being 166 points better than any of his competitors.
He has a slew of college offers in track and field, but said the Air Force Academy and Harvard are his favorites at this point.
But this fall, fans will get to see Richards star on the gridiron. He had a season for the ages last fall when he ran for 789 yards, caught 37 passes for 610 yards, threw for 100 yards and had 533 return yards. Add it all up, and that’s 2,042 yards with 160 total points via his 25 touchdowns and five two-point conversions.
If that’s not enough to impress, he added 63 tackles and three pass breakups from his safety position.
“You could see a lot of me,” Richards said of the coming season. “I’ll be at safety most of the time on defense, though we’ll add some blitz packages. I’ll be on punt return and kick return like last year, too.