Junior of the Year: Bomar best in show

A game unfolded in the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex early last fall that will be remembered for years to come.

The two teams – North Mesquite and Grand Prairie - were good, yet neither squad would ever achieve greatness that season.

However, a couple of young players in that game truly blossomed and proved more than worth the price of admission.

North Mesquite, led by Rivals100 cornerback Tarell Brown, beat Grand Prairie in a 45-42 thriller that wasn’t decided until the game’s closing seconds.

Even though Brown rushed for 293 yards and four touchdowns (three

that were more than 50 yards) on just 18 carries and also made one interception that night, his Herculean effort almost wasn’t enough.

Grand Prairie’s junior quarterback Rhett Bomar

(right) came close to stealing the show with his fourth quarter passing display.

Leading an improbable 22-point fourth-quarter comeback, the 6-foot-3, 195-pound Bomar picked apart a North Mequite secondary that had three Division I recruits in its lineup.

Bomar finished the contest connecting on 21 of 32 passes for 407 yards and four touchdowns.

His performance in that game is just one of the reasons why Bomar has been selected as the Rivals100.com national junior of the year.

And Bomar has the talent to rank right up there with them.

Bomar finished his senior season with 2,860 passing yards, completing 163 of his 265 attempts. He threw for 25 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. He also rushed for 717 yards on 119 carries.

Of course, the nation is filled with players with statistics at least similar to Bomar.

So what makes Bomar such a special player?

“I think it’s the intangibles that you can’t measure,” explained Rhett’s father Jerry, who also is the high school coach of the talented right-hander.

“He has it all – arm strength, accuracy, great feet – but he can do the little things. He checks off at the line of scrimmage or whatever he gets us doing the right things. I think he’s a coach’s son, so he’s been around it, been in the locker room and on the sidelines from a very young age.”

The younger Bomar also thinks being a coach’s son has paid off.

“I think I understand the defenses better than most people,” he said. “I can kind of see what a lot of them are trying to do and that gives me an advantage, and it lets me just go play and do my thing.”

But it’s not just being a coach’s son that has college coaches across the country clamoring for the young Bomar’s attention.

His combination of arm strength, accuracy, maturity, size, athleticism, footwork, speed and academics (5.0 GPA on a 4.0 scale) make him a true can’t miss prospect for the class of 2004.

“I saw Rhett at a camp last summer and he was the best player there over all the seniors,” Jeremy Crabtree, national analyst of Rivals100.com, said.

“Then I went to watch him play in person and he was awesome. It was his scrambling ability that really amazed me. I knew from the camp that the kid was blessed with an amazing and accurate arm, but his ability to run quarterback draws, scramble for a big first down and just do what it took to get the extra yard impressed me.”

“You’re going to chuckle when I say this, but in some ways he's got the athletic ability of a Kordell Stewart with the arm of a John Elway. He’s potentially that good. He's about as complete of a quarterback as I've seen in some time.”

His talents aren’t limited to the football field. Bomar’s also an elite baseball player, playing varsity since his freshman year and hitting .430 with five homeruns and 30 RBIs as a sophomore.

But football coaches needn’t fear. Bomar’s heart is on the gridiron.

“I want to play in the NFL,” he said. “That’s been my dream since I was a little kid.”

Bomar is still trying to figure out what destination after Grand Prairie will be the next stop on the way to accomplishing his NFL dream.

And he has yet to really narrow down his list of college choices, but he says he already knows some schools he’s interested in learning more about.

He says he and his father are expected to go to Oklahoma and Texas practices this spring, and then this summer the family is set to take a trip to Georgia and Florida State to look into their programs as well.

Other trips could be on the horizon and have been discussed, but nothing has been firmed up.

He has in mind what he’s going to be looking for when he visits all of the different schools.

“I’m going to be interested in the offense, I want a throwing offense,” he said. “I’d like to go to a team with prestige. I want to go somewhere that the coaches have a good relationship with the players, where there’s a good education. I guess I pretty much want it all.”

Arizona State, Texas A&M, Colorado, UCLA, Oklahoma State and LSU have already offered him a chance to continue his dream, along with the Longhorns and Sooners.

But don’t expect a college decision from Bomar anytime soon.

About the only thing Bomar says he is trying to decide about football right now is if he will be a mid-term graduate or not. Because of his excellent academic record he could skip his senior prom in favor of spring practice at the school of his liking.

If he does indeed graduate early and can participate in spring practice, then that’s just another feather in the cap of the nation’s top junior prospect.

Others considered for the Rivals100.com junior of the year included California defensive back Randy Estes, Pennslyvania quarterback Anthony Morelli and Florida quarterback Xavier Lee.

“You’re going to chuckle when I say this, but in some ways he's got the athletic ability of a Kordell Stewart with the arm of a John Elway. He’s potentially that good. He's about as complete of a quarterback as I've seen in some time.”

- Jeremy Crabtree, national analyst for Rivals100.coms