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Hounshell ready for responsibility

Mentor (Ohio) Lake Catholic three-star offensive tackle Chad Hounshell feels a sense of responsibility to his team, his community and most importantly to himself. So that's why now that his senior season is rapidly approaching it looks more and more like recruiting will go on the back burner.
"I'd like to figure out where I'm going as quick as possible," Hounshell, who is the nation's No. 70 offensive tackle and the No. 38 player in Ohio, said.
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"But it's going to have to go on the back burner. I'm going to pay attention as much as I can to recruiting, but it's going to be second to my senior season. I'm going to put as much as I can into my senior season. Being a big leader on the team, I really need to pay attention and stay focused on helping my team any way I can."
And that's a responsibility that he doesn't mind at all.
"Of course when you're the only guy on the team that has this unique opportunity to play college football, people are going to look up to you," Hounshell said.
"I do have guys on the team look up to me because they don't have the chances that I'm getting. A lot of the guys on the team are into what I'm going to do. They ask me all the time 'who's your top team, and who did you get offered by.' It's both cool, but there's also a lot of responsibility for me to stay focused on helping the team win."
With scholarship offers from Cincinnati, Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Akron, Kent and a new offer from Air Force, it would be easy for Hounshell to get distracted, but he's not. He's still up in the air about what teams he really likes at this point, and his list changes in his head about every day.
"I could give you a list of schools that I like, but that could change in two weeks when I get more offers or when I just start to like another school," he said. "It really changes for me on a daily basis. That's what makes this so tough on me."
Hounshell was slated to visit Michigan State earlier this month for the Spartans' summer camp, but he wasn't able to make it.
"We had it all set up, and then my dad got some work called in," he said. "I explained to the coaches that I wasn't going to make it up there, and they understood. They said they're going to watch me early in my senior season, and that's something that I would really like. I would love another Big Ten offer. It'd be an incredible opportunity."
Just like the opportunity for him to be the leader on his team.
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