Florida LB to make Big Ten visit this weekend

Altamonte Springs (Fla.) Lake Brantley linebacker Josh Ferguson is heading up north for an official visit this weekend.

"Actually I am going to Purdue this Saturday on an official visit," Ferguson said. "They're playing Michigan so it's a big game for them."

Purdue recently offered a scholarship to the 6-foot-2, 210 pound outside linebacker. He's also talking with hometown UCF about a visit.

"UCF wants me to visit them in January so I'm probably going to do that," Ferguson said. "I think it was the 10th of January. Right now my top two are UCF and Purdue."

Ferguson said he was also getting calls from Vanderbilt, West Virginia and Georgia Southern.

Lake Brantley scored a big victory last week over defending state champion Apopka. The two schools don't play in the same district but the nearby schools are both in Class 6A. Lake Brantley competes in Class 6A, District 1 which is one of the more geographically diverse in the state. Lake Brantley, Seminole, and Oviedo are located in Seminole County north of Orlando, DeLand is a little bit north of Orlando in Volusia County, and also in the district are three Jacksonville schools-- Ed White, Mandarin, and Sandalwood. The spread out distances forces teams to travel over two hours each way for games when the Seminole County and Jacksonville schools meet.

"Our record is 4-2," Ferguson said. "We've lost to both Jacksonville teams so far. The first game was a home game actually and we played Ed White. We played Mandarin the following week and we lost by three. I got injured in the Ed White game. I rolled my ankle and we were winning 14-zip and I feel that was a key factor in the game, like a turning point in the game because after that we just started playing real bad. We actually played pretty good when we went up to Mandarin the following week but those refs... It was just kind of crazy with the calls. It was like out of nowhere. We lost 21-24."

Josh feels Lake Brantley needs to win out with a record of 8-2 to make the playoffs and be district runner-ups. They still must face Oviedo, Seminole, Lake Mary, and Sandalwood.

"I'm not really sure about stats because I did miss a couple games," Ferguson said. "My first game back was the DeLand game. I'm probably in the 20s right now as far as tackles go. I had a fumble recovery in Friday night's game against Apopka."