Seward letting play do the talking

Jacquese Seward is a name to know around middle Tennessee. The Nashville (Tenn.) Hillsboro running back amassed over 2,100 yards as a junior and is one of a few frontrunners for Tennessee's 4A Mr. Football award. With his team losing in the semifinals of the state tournament the past two seasons, Seward has plenty of goals for both himself and his team.

"My goal is just for us to finish off the year as we plan to do," Seward said. "I just don't want us to get down and get a big head. I want us to finish out and make it to week 15 (state finals).

"I don't like talking about personal goals," he said. "I rushed for 2,170 yards last season and I just want to get close to that, get close to 2,000. It's gonna be close to what I had last year, but all three linebackers are keying on me sometimes so I have to work at it to get it. I'm just glad when they key on me, our receivers can get open and make plays."

In his team's lone loss of the season, Seward had had a stomach virus, strepped throat and a cold the week leading up to the game, but still managed 98 yards on 15 carries. After the early season loss, Hillsboro High School has been playing well and Seward is leading the charge.

"It's been going well," he said. "We're 5-1. Last week I had 231 yards rushing and three TDs. The week before that I had 180 yards and four touchdowns."

At 5-foot-10, 165-pounds, Seward is a smaller back but that didn't stop Indiana from issuing him an offer over the summer. However, with Indiana as his only current offer, Seward is keeping his options open and exploring some SEC programs that have shown him some interest.

"Me and (2009 prospect) Eric Gordon went to the UT game against Georgia and I was supposed to go to the Memphis game Saturday," he said. "I might go to the Alabama-Tennessee game."

Seward lists Michigan State, Marshall, Memphis, Indiana, Western Kentucky, Kentucky and several OVC schools as the programs that are showing him the most interest, while Tennessee is a school he'd like to hear more from.

"I like every school that I named but I really want UT to pay more attention to me," he said.

With Seward's speed and quickness along with his size limitations, the move to defensive back is an obvious interest to some schools. Tennessee is one school that has posed that hypothetical.

"I talked to the coach at Tennessee and they talked about moving me to defensive back," he said. "But I had talked to Will Bartholomew who played at Tennessee and he said that running back's the position for me. I told them I can play DB, but I know that I can play running back. It's not that I won't play another position, I just want to try running back."

As a running back on pace to rush for over 4,000 yards in two seasons, Seward is doing everything he can to prove things on the field.