Club football team ready for 2012 season

Kris Mason
Staff Writer

Inside the Barnes and Noble bookstore at VCU, there is tons of Rams gear including t-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, cups and pens fans can purchase to show their support.

One t-shirt in particular rallies VCU spirit by bragging, “VCU Football, Still Undefeated.”

But a football team associated with VCU actually has lost three games in its history. VCU’s club football team, while it is not a Division I team, still competes against other universities.

The club was founded last year by VCU students Cole Ransom, Jales Charles and James Tait.

In the team’s inaugural season they compiled a 2-3 record. One of the highlights of the season was upsetting previously undefeated Coppin State in Baltimore. VCU ended up being Coppin State’s only loss of the year. The Rams knocked off the champion and advanced to all the way to the conference championship before falling to George Mason.

Some of the team’s key returners are cornerbacks Sam Smoot and Mark Hall, along with wide receiver Mike Hodges and quarterback Mike Jones.

Hodges has high expectations for the upcoming season.

“Our goal is to get back to the conference championship and take back what is ours,” he said.

Taking back what is theirs won’t be an easy task. The team is currently made up of approximately 25 players. The club struggles to get players because of the time commitment required to be on the team.

Defensive back Mo Elghoul acknowledges that the 2012 team has had its share of bumps in the road in the preseason so far because of the small amount of players, but he doesn’t feel that it will hold back the team.

“The numbers are not great, but if we keep improving every day and every practice then we can have a great season,” he said. Outside linebacker and fullback Gabriel Thornton said he agreed.

“It’s a little rougher than last year, but that just means we have to put in the extra hard work.”

The team recruits players through word-of-mouth, flyers and participating in university-wide recruitment events like the SOVO fair.

The team primarily consists of students who played in high school and either didn’t get scholarship consideration to play at another college or chose not to play.

Thornton played football at Armstrong High School in Richmond. He knew VCU didn’t have an NCAA football team when he came to the university and thought his playing days were over.

“When I found out about the club team, I saw it as an opportunity to get back on field,” Thornton said.

The long-term goal of the team is to eventually have it become a sanctioned sport at VCU.

“Our goal is to make the team competitive and eventually get it to the point where this is the real team,” Thornton said. “We want to make it more than a club, we want it to be the VCU football team.”

VCU plays its home games at Thomas Jefferson High School in Richmond. They open the season at home Sept. 8  against the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.CT