Intangibles Will Help Commits Fit With JMU
Loyalty goes a long way with Scott Fisher, the fourth-year coach at Northside High School in Roanoke.
It’s why Fisher said his two-way standout, Zach Horton, deserves all the interest he’s garnered from different college programs and the potential success he could have at James Madison in the coming years. Horton committed to the Dukes as a tight end and joined their 2021 recruiting class last week.
“We had a lot of kids leave our team for greener pastures last year,” Fisher explained, “but Zach stayed, and it paid off for him. High school kids are going to get noticed wherever they play at and as a high school football coach I hate it when guys transfer either into or out of our program. It infuriates me, so I think it speaks wonders about his character that he stayed.”
Horton evolved into a player his teammates and Fisher relied on when they needed to. Fisher said following the exodus of former key contributors for Northside that Horton became a steady personality the Vikings trusted during their run to the Virginia High School League Class 3 Region D finals and a 9-4 finish.
Individually, Horton was the Blue Ridge District Co-Defensive Player of the Year and earned first-team All-Blue Ridge District honors at tight end and defensive end.
“Absolutely, and Zach has been a good teammate to his teammates,” Fisher said. “He’s a quiet leader and he’s not a big rah-rah kind of guy, but he says, ‘Look. Just throw me the ball, let me make my play, and we’ll move on.’ He’s a blue-collar mentality football player.”
The impact Horton had on Northside this past fall, as Fisher shared, is similar to what prep coaches of other commits in JMU’s 2021 class said about their players, too.
Former Mount St. Joseph (Baltimore) coach Rich Holzer said without quarterback Billy Atkins’ selflessness, the Gaels might not have captured the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association Class A crown.
Atkins was the second verbal pledge in this recruiting cycle for the Dukes and began a run of five commitments over six days for JMU when he made his decision on May 21. He chose JMU’s offer over opportunities from FBS Buffalo as well as Colonial Athletic Association members Delaware, Rhode Island, Richmond, Stony Brook, Towson and William & Mary.
“We put a lot on the quarterback,” said Holzer, who departed Mount St. Joseph this offseason to take the same job at Northern-Calvert, which is closer to his home. “There are times when Billy makes play calls and people are patting me on the back after the game, and they’re like, ‘That was a great call coach,’ but I’m like, ‘I wish I would’ve made it.’
“For example, in our championship game this year on the winning touchdown I had called a pass play. But I told him anytime we get a six-man box and the defensive end slides out to a nine-technique, the power [run] to our good running back [Marlowe Wax], who signed with Syracuse, is going to be there. And sure enough, Billy checked out of a pass play, into power and we ran for a 17-yard touchdown to win the game.
“But most quarterbacks would not check out of a pass play into a freaking run play and he did that. He’s that type of kid. They’re getting a really good one, someone who is unselfish and works his rear end off. He just wants to be really good and that’s it.”
Holzer said he expressed Atkins’ attributes to JMU offensive line coach Damian Wroblewski, the lead recruiter on the quarterback. Wroblewski and Holzer, a former Hofstra offensive lineman, know each other well through their stints at the school on Long Island. Wroblewski was on staff there in 2004 and 2005.
“I told Wrobo that Billy is the type of kid that you have to tell to stop,” Holzer said. “He never stops between the weight room and film study. Every coach dreads a player that you have to motivate to do stuff, but Billy has an insane internal drive that we actually have to shut him down at times. He’ll say his arm is sore from throwing 200-plus balls at practice and the next thing you know he’s loading up 250 pounds on the bench press and he’s bench pressing. We’re like, ‘Dude, relax. Go in the training room.’ He’s that type of kid, and he’s been a starter since he was a freshman. He is probably – as long as we play football this year – going to break the Maryland state career passing record.”
Both Holzer and Fisher said their players are more than prepared to thrive at JMU.
“Being a basketball player helps him position himself to go up and get the 50-50 and jump ball,” Fisher said about Horton. “He’s got the physicality to get off the line of scrimmage. We play him in the standup slot position. We spread him out and play him as a three-by-one receiver on the single side and then we play him with his hand on the ground, so he’s familiar with all three aspects of it.”
Holzer said of Atkins: “He only threw five interceptions last year and four the year before, and that’s throwing well over 230 times. He’s got a great mind for football and his arm is extremely strong. He can make all the throws. He can throw the field-side out stuff and the field-side comebacks. He’s a very smart kid and I think he’s a great fit for JMU.”
As a junior, Atkins threw for 3,089 yards and 36 touchdowns en route to the MIAA Class A championship.
Of the six commits in the class to this point, five were on teams that reached the postseason last year. Stone Bridge (Ashburn) linebacker Skylar Martin, a three-star prospect by Rivals.com, who committed this past Tuesday, helped the Bulldogs reach the VHSL Class 5 championship where they fell to Maury. Offensive lineman Scott Hummel, the first commit in the class, had a deep run in the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association postseason with Linganore (Frederick, Md.), and Statesville (N.C.) wide receiver Jasaiah Gathings played a role the Greyhounds' trip to the North Carolina High School Athletic Association 3A playoffs.
The lone JMU pledge on a team that failed to reach the postseason in 2019 was Battlefield (Haymarket) linebacker Matt Binkowski, but the situation at his school was different.
After leading R.E. Lee (Staunton) for four seasons, which included a run to the 2017 VHSL Class 2 championship game, former Lee coach Scott Girolmo took the same gig at Battlefield with a rebuild looming. Girolmo said he identified Binkowski as a player capable of helping spur a turnaround.
“Matt is absolutely a 100 percent team player,” Girolmo said, “playing where we need him. We used him at multiple positions on both sides. … He’s a guy that gets fitted to different spots on the field where the ball is likely going to go.”
According to Girolmo, Binkowski played slot receiver, running back and occasionally as a running quarterback on offense, and on defense began the season at nickel and outside linebacker, but transitioned to a hybrid defensive end/outside linebacker for the last six weeks of year. Girolmo said Binkowski had 11 sacks out of that spot.
This coming season, Binkowski will even play some safety in certain packages, Girolmo said, even though the 6-foot-1, 218-pounder will likely play linebacker for the Dukes.
At the time Binkowski committed to JMU last week, he had earned scholarship offers from a mix of 25 FBS and FCS schools.
“Nowadays they need defenders at that [college] level who can do everything because of how open offenses are,” Girolmo said. “Specifically with how much and how often second- and third-level defenders are conflicted against run-pass option. They need to have players who can play hybrid positions in most levels of the defense, so you’ve got to have guys like Matt, who have these inherent utility skill sets because you’re going to require them to do so many different things. … I wouldn’t pretend to know how they would use him, but I definitely know that the more versatile he his, the more experience he has and the more skilled he is, the better he will be for them.”
Girolmo is more than familiar with JMU football since he lived in nearby Staunton for four years. He said he was a frequent visitor at the Dukes’ spring practices during his time living in The Valley, and with his understanding of the program as well as the personality of Binkowski that he believes the two parties are a great match for each other.
“I know what type of kids fit in well with their school culture,” Girolmo said. “And he’s a long-haired, jean-short-and-boot wearing, American-flag toting, playing music all the time and happy-go-lucky, blue-collar kid who will absolutely fit in and he’ll have the time of his life there. They’ll gravitate toward him. He’s no Gage Steele, but he’s not bad.”