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football Edit

Big decisions for ATH Williams

Athlete Deunta Williams from Jacksonville (N.C.) White Oak had coaches visiting from North Carolina State, Virginia, Wake Forest, South Carolina and Clemson among others as the evaluation hit full swing. Did any one visit stand out for him?
"Chuck Amato came to my school and I have a lot of respect for him," he said. "If I don't go to his school he'll be the first to congratulate me. He's a really classy guy and he has really brought North Carolina State up and to have the head coach himself visit is cool.
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"Virginia, Wake Forest and Clemson all stopped by as well. They all have great programs though and I'm looking forward to seeing what they're going to do."
The 6-foot-3, 195-pounder also picked up an offer most recently from Virginia Tech a month ago and is expecting one from Wake Forest soon.
"I was impressed with the Virginia Tech offer," he said. "I haven't heard from them recently, but their track record of people in the NFL is impressive. That's my primary goal. I'm looking forward to Virginia Tech's recruiting day on June 11th. Wake Forest is taking their time to offer because they just want to evaluate me more and look into my character and stuff."
Besides offers, Williams is receiving a lot of interest from Florida.
"Coach Holliday used to be at North Carolina State and I am tight with him," he said. "I lost a little interest for North Carolina State when he left. I'm excited to hear from him again now that he's at Florida, but I think I kind of want to stay close to home and Florida is like 18 hours, so I don't know."
Williams recently attended the Shrine Bowl combine.
"I did pretty decent there, I got a lot of attention," he said. "I jumped 36 inches in the vertical and I benched 22 reps on 185-pounds. I ran 4.3 flat in the shuttle."
Right now, Williams's favorites are North Carolina, North Carolina State, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Duke.
Despite the fact that offers are flying in for Williams, there are some big question marks as to his recruiting. One is that the athlete is considering graduating early.
"I'm still contemplating graduating early and getting a head start so that I can play early," he said. "I haven't ruled it out yet and my grades are in line, I'm just thinking about it now."
Another is that Williams is looking at heading to the same school as Southwest Onslow's Kendrick Burney.
"We've talked about it and we want to go to the same college so that may be a factor, but it won't be nearly as big as fitting in," he said. "We're really good friends and that's a person I know. We're both give 110-percent and you have to have people around you like that in order to win. He's a playmaker and I'm a playmaker, we can make a team pretty decent together. We've been in contact all the time and I talked to him a lot. There was talk he was going to commit somewhere, but that wasn't true. I bet we'll commit really close to each other and it'll be a decision we make with our families."
Williams is looking to make a decision sometime soon as well.
"I want to make it before the football season starts," he said. "I want to clear my mind of colleges and focus on taking our team to the championship. I'm thinking around August sometime."
Finally, what position will he play in college?
"I'm mainly being looked at as a safety and wide receiver," he said. "If they want to beef me up I could play linebacker or even running back. I like to make plays, but I also like to hit people so it doesn't really matter to me."
Williams is still being hampered by a hamstring injury.
"It's going pretty good, it's just nagging," he said. "I want to get it back to 100% and let it heal completely over the next month. My eye is on the football season, so everything else like track is secondary."
Next season, Williams is looking to make an even bigger impact to help his team win.
"I'm looking to break the school record for most interceptions in a game," he said. "I'm also looking to win associate player of the year and the team is trying to go undefeated, but we play New Bern and they are tough."
The athlete is looking to head to the camps at Wake Forest, North Carolina State, Duke, North Carolina, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Clemson this summer.
Williams was named all-conference, all-area and all-position as he ran for 250 yards and three touchdowns, passed for 200 yards and caught 16 receptions for 400 yards and 11 touchdowns. He also added seven interceptions.
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