UB football has a pair drafted
Scott to Oakland; Richard to Indy
By Rodney McKissic -- News Sports Reporter
Updated: 04/28/08 9:40 AM
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- Jamey Richard made UB history.
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The feel-good stories continued Sunday for the University at Buffalo football program.
UB had two players selected in the NFL draft for the first time in school history when defensive end Trevor Scott was picked by the Oakland Raiders in the sixth round and center Jamey Richard was selected in the seventh round by the Indianapolis Colts.
Scott and Richard, who led UB to a share of the Mid-American Conference East Division championship, are the first Bulls drafted since 2000 when the Buffalo Bills picked wide receiver Drew Haddad in the seventh round.
Scott was selected by the Raiders with the 169th pick overall, while Richard was taken with the 236th pick. Richard joins former UB linebacker Ramon Guzman, who the Colts signed as an undrafted free agent last season.
Two years ago, Scott was a tight end with nine career receptions when he was converted to defensive end because then first-year coach Turner Gill had little depth at the position. Nineteen sacks later, Scott is a member of the Raiders, the first team Scott visited during the offseason.
“I wasn’t expecting anything,” Scott said. “That way if I didn’t get drafted I wouldn’t feel down. I didn’t get my hopes up, but at the same time I wanted to be drafted and I stayed cool about the whole thing. I wasn’t even watching the draft.”
Instead, Scott’s parents and brothers watched the draft unfold while he watched movies and took long drives near his home in Potsdam.
“I watched Gladiators and 300,” he said. “You know, guy movies.”
Scott was sitting in an easy chair when a Raiders secretary called and informed him he had been selected.
“She called and told me they were
going to take me in the draft as a Raider and I started freaking out,” he said.
Then Scott spoke with defensive coordinator Rob Ryan and defensive line coach Keith Millard.
“We told you we liked you,” they told Scott, “did you think we were playing?”
Unlike Scott, Richard agonized as he watched the entire draft with his family from his home in Weston, Conn. He was projected to go as high as the fifth round and started receiving calls from teams at the beginning of the sixth round. Richard said several teams, which he declined to name, were attempting to make deals to bring him in as an undrafted free agent.
“Teams were calling me saying, ‘We’ve got these picks, but we’re not sure what we’re going to do. You’re our priority, yada, yada, yada.’ Then their pick came up and they passed over me,” Richard said. “How is it from the five minutes when we talked that I go from being a top priority to not being one?”
So he waited.
“It’s a surreal feeling,” he said. “The longer I waited, the more uncertainty crept in. I had prepared myself to be a free agent, but I was happy when the Colts called.”
Richard watched as defensive end after defensive end came off the board when he turned to his mother Gina and said, “Damn, at this rate, Trevor is going to be gone soon. The moment I said that, Trevor’s name flashed across the screen.”
Richard sent him a congratulations text message and Scott thanked and asked, “What’s going on with you?”
Richard wrote back, “I’m getting jerked around and I might have to go free agent.”
“Just chill,” Scott wrote, “I think it’s going to happen soon.”
As soon as Richard finished reading Scott’s text, the phone rang. It was Colts General Manager Bill Polian.
“He called to tell me I was going to be a Colt,” Richard said.
•••
Michigan State running back Jehuu Caulcrick, the 2002 Connolly Cup winner at Clymer, went undrafted but the New York Jets signed him as a free agent shortly after the draft ended and he will try to hook on with them. . . . No one was drafted from Syracuse.
