Not to be Underestimated

Despite his diminutive frame, Rashad Campbell was a workhorse running back for Chestnut Hill Academy last season, touching the ball nearly 300 times on offense. Campbell made the trip to Storrs to take in spring practice this month and came away with a good feeling.

Rashad Campbell is being recruiting by a few Division I-A programs right now, but the most intense interest he has been receiving has been from Ivy League schools. Because of his 5-foot-8, 170-pound frame, some schools may overlook the Philadelphia native, but few that have played against him would make the mistake of underestimating him.

“I went up to Connecticut for their spring practices with my family and got the chance to meet the entire coaching staff,” Campbell said. “Coach (Matt) Cersosimo is a really nice guy and has been making sure I have my academics in check consistently which is a big focus of mine. Right now I’m carrying a 2.97 core GPA and I scored a 23 on my ACT which I plan to re-take on June 9th to keep Ivy League options open.”

“After I met with the staff they introduced me to one of the running backs, Terry Caulley who talked to me for a while and had me sit in on a running backs meeting with the rest of the guys,” Campbell stated. “The guys were all working hard and concentrating, but you could also sense that family atmosphere as there was some joking around.”

“The facilities were the best I’ve seen by far and they had a bigger dome then what I’ve seen before, so they can actually punt indoors and do whatever they need to in there. There was a lot of little state of the art things they had in the weight room that were really impressive and I liked the little track they had to do your 40 on.”

“Overall I’d give the visit an 8 out of 10,” Campbell added. “It wasn’t a very nice day out, so I didn’t get to see much of the campus, but I did like what I saw. I think I’d be comfortable going to school there and would like to be at a place that size because I’m used to going to a small private school. I think going to a larger school where I’m on a bigger stage would push me to work even harder for my teammates and people counting on me just like it does back home. I’ll be going back up to Connecticut for camp in June and we’ll see where it goes from there.”

Campbell is also being recruited by a select group of I-A programs like Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Stanford, however most of his interest is coming from Ivy League schools such as Columbia, Harvard, Yale, Brown, Princeton and Cornell, who have been frequent visitors at Chestnut Hill Academy.

As a junior, Campbell carried 255 times for 1748 yards and 22 touchdowns in ten games. He also caught nine passes for 80 yards and threw a touchdown pass. He also added 30 tackles and two interceptions from his cornerback position. He was voted first team All-League and All-City, second team All-Southeastern PA and received a Mini-Maxwell Award.