The Evangel Christian (La.) Academy head football coach played defensive tackle for four years at LSU. One of his former players, Chris Bradley, appeared in 13 games as a freshman at TCU last fall. Another pupil, Jermauria Rasco, led LSU in sacks as a senior last season.
Evangel Christian is known as “D-Line High” in Louisiana because of the number of college prospects it produces, Dawson said. And in 11 years of coaching, he thinks one is better than the rest.
That’s Jerry Tillery, a nearly 6-foot-7, 300-pound freshman defensive tackle. The Shreveport (La.) native started running with Notre Dame’s first-team defense six practices in to his first taste of college football.
Tillery’s quick ascent up the depth chart didn’t surprise his high school coach, who presented at Notre Dame’s coaches’ clinic this past Saturday in a session on the subject he knows best: defensive line play.
“What makes Jerry so unique is he has that great technique and fundamentals that he’s learned at Evangel but he also has the size and the strength to go with it,” said Dawson. “Now you put all that together and you’ve got something nasty.”
His Notre Dame teammates picked up on the freshman’s ability and nicknamed him because of it.
“We call him ‘Tank’ because he just does everything right, it seems like,” rising senior defensive tackle Sheldon Day said. “You can definitely tell that he’s mature and he’s definitely ready to come play.”
But Tillery’s uniqueness isn’t limited to his football talent. He’s an avid learner, someone who took an interest in topics most high school students ignore.
Dawson said he would see his defensive tackle reading stock reports in Evangel Christian’s locker room. For one of Tillery’s birthdays, his parents bought him The New York Times’ iPhone app, his coach added. Before then, he borrowed the paper from an assistant coach’s classroom. There was never enough information for the Notre Dame pre-med student to consume.
“Jerry’s a unique kid,” Dawson said. “He’s focusing on his financial planning right now. 401k. He’s always asking questions. Whenever you’re a guy that’s response is always asking questions, you’re going to get answers. And that’s how you’re going to get knowledge.”
Academics played an important role through his college recruiting process. Tillery used one of his official visits to see Dartmouth College last November. He took in an Ivy League football game between Harvard and the Big Green.
Tillery's transition to high school wasn't without growing pains. He left behind friends at Calvary Baptist (La.) Academy when he transferred to Evangel Christian. At first, the coaching staff job was purely trying to make sure Tillery was happy at school.
“That took several months,” Dawson said. “And then his sophomore year, just getting him to buy into our system, because when a guy is coming in from another school, they have bad habits. You’ve got to break those habits.”
Next came his breakout season.
“His junior year, he excelled,” said Dawson. “He started doing some great things on the defensive line. I think he started buying into being a defensive lineman per se. And not just an offensive lineman or a two-way guy.”
Tillery received scholarship offers the next spring from LSU, Mississippi and Stanford. Notre Dame offered in June. Even though he was recruited mostly as an offensive lineman, his coach didn’t have any doubts that Tillery, who played on both sides of the ball through high school, would be most valuable on the defensive line at the next level.
“I think just because of his height and his wingspan, people just automatically turned him into the prototypical offensive lineman,” said Dawson. “But I kept reminding him that 6-7, 300-pound offensive linemen come a dime a dozen. When you’re that size as a defensive lineman, that’s freakish.”
Tillery weighed around 330 pounds that spring – around the same time he began to compete in 5K runs. Then he moved on to 10Ks. By the end of the summer, the defensive lineman had competed in two triathlons. Those summer workouts in Louisiana trimmed Tillery down to around 310 pounds by start of his senior season, and the difference was noticeable on the field.
“That was a big turnaround because he was a guy that was, I wouldn’t say he was lazy,” said Dawson. “But sometimes a big guy like that in hot Louisiana, he was trying to take some short cuts. But the spring before his senior year he really started to attack.
“He went from being big and good and passive to being big and good and aggressive. And I think that took him to another level when he really got caught up in the fitness part.”
This spring, Notre Dame’s coaching staff is seeing the finished product of another Evangel Christian product. Tillery is the first recruit from Louisiana to enroll at Notre Dame under Brian Kelly. Defensive end Bo Wallace will be the second Louisiana native when he joins Tillery in June.
Based on what the coaches have seen from Tillery, there could be some more trips in the future to “D-Line High.”
“He’s just a unique player,” Kelly said of Tillery. “One that I can’t remember that I’ve coached. He has a unique ability at such a young age to use his hands. Where we spend the first year and a half trying to get these kids to not drop their head and be overextended, he immediately can use his hands and use his size to his advantage.
“I’m so leery to talk about a freshman, but he’s a unique talent.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Stock reports, triathlons, official visit to Dartmouth and cracking first-team DL as a freshman. Meet Jerry Tillery: <a href="http://t.co/09S04bwdJy">http://t.co/09S04bwdJy</a></p>— Nick Ironside (@nironside247) <a href="https://twitter.com/nironside247/status/582918172354879488">March 31, 2015</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
