Spiders go south, benefit from injection of Atlanta-area talent

Cecil Flowe has coached football at Parkview High School in Lilburn, Ga., since 1991. He doesn't remember making the acquaintance of any University of Richmond recruiters at his school, located outside Atlanta, until about five years ago.

"Since, they have gotten some great players from the [Atlanta] area," Flowe said of the Spiders, who shared the 2007 Colonial Athletic Association title and won the 2008 Football Championship Subdivision title.

"Richmond stepping up its recruiting is evident by the championship seasons they now have with a bigger and better recruiting pool."

Get a map. Around Atlanta, draw a circle with a 30-mile radius. That real estate supplied UR with several of the finest players currently involved with Richmond's most prominent sports: football and men's and women's basketball.

When the Spiders open next football season, they'll do so with a four-year starter at quarterback, Eric Ward, from Atlanta. UR's starting tailback, Justin Forte, is from Marietta, Ga., as is David Gonzalvez (16.0 ppg), a guard on Richmond's basketball team. UR's other backcourt starter, Kevin Anderson (16.6 ppg), is from Duluth, Ga., and reserve forward Darrius Garrett came from Powder Springs, Ga.

Among the starters on the women's team in 2008-09 was 6-2 freshman Nikita Thomas, who's from Atlanta.

UR assistant football coach Vincent Brown recruits Georgia, and he noted that in just one county near Atlanta (Gwinnett), there are 17 high schools with 157,000 students. What Brown considers the "Atlanta area" includes 100 public high schools and dozens of private schools that have competitive programs.

"Football is extremely important down there, with very well-established youth feeder programs connected to the high schools," said Brown. Top-notch coaching, grand facilities and booster clubs' support also fortifies Atlanta-area football, according to Brown.

Only 1.3 percent (35 students) of Richmond's 2,695 undergraduate enrollment was from the Atlanta metro area in 2007-08, the last school year for which statistics are available. But UR's coaches, seeking quality athletes who can handle Richmond's demanding academics, obviously have discovered fertile recruiting ground in a part of the country that has experienced rapid population growth in recent decades.

"The academic strength of schools in the Atlanta [area] and the north Georgia area is very strong," said Michael Shafer, a University of Georgia women's basketball assistant for 11 years before becoming UR's head coach four years ago. "These students are truly getting great [high-school] educations, plus getting to play against great competition."

Well-organized and highly competitive AAU programs accelerate basketball development there, added Shafer, a Georgia native. UR men's basketball coach Chris Mooney said that the Spiders were able to sign Anderson, the 2008 Atlantic 10 Conference rookie of the year, partly because a large number of Division I prospects in the Atlanta area probably overshadowed the 6-footer.

There were no football players in Richmond's program from the Atlanta area when former Spiders' coach Dave Clawson signed Ward, Forte and defensive end Pierre Turner (Lawrenceville, Ga.). They will be fifth-year seniors this coming season, when UR's roster will include seven Atlanta-area residents. Clawson's staff is responsible for six of them.

Clawson, now Bowling Green's head coach, said, "We always felt, for our level of football, that we could go down there and if [the prospect] was a good student, the only competition we would have is Furman." While there are few FCS schools like Richmond in the Southeast, there are many comparable in the Northeast. That's where UR did much of its recruiting before Clawson was hired by Richmond in 2004.

The Spiders still often go north for football players, but "we really thought that if you went north of Richmond, now everyone had to drive by other [FCS] schools to come to Richmond," Clawson said. "If we went down south, we felt like maybe we could beat Southern Conference teams on recruits, which most of the time we could and we did."

Contact John O'Connor at (804) 649-6233