Carney's emergence at Wake no surprise to Davidson Day's Grier

DAVIDSON, N.C. — Davidson Day football coach Chad Grier has shown the video to more than a hundred people, not including the 84 retweets and 176 likes he’s earned on Twitter.

The 10-second clip from spring practice encapsulates Wake Forest freshman running back Cade Carney in a nutshell. Carney takes a handoff, finds a hole on the left side of the line and bursts through the gap. About 15-yards down field, Carney makes a juke and jive move to elude another would-be tackler, but even then, the fun hasn’t yet begun.

Carney sees another defender ahead, but with momentum on his side, decides to just completely barrel through him, kind of shrugging him aside as his feet continue to carry him to the end zone.

Speed, power, elusiveness and ceaseless drive. Carney showed it all on that rep.

“This is what you missed,” Grier says to college coaches who comes through Davidson Day this year. “I love showing this.”

The conventional wisdom is that Carney exceeded expectations with his spring performance at Wake. Grier is not in that camp.

“Yeah. What did you expect?” Grier asks when people act surprised about Carney.

“It’s almost funny to me that I keep hearing that he had this remarkable spring. I’m like, If you just wrote on a piece of paper that here’s a running back that weighs 212-215 pounds, on laser runs a 4.5-40, he’s got a 40-inch vertical jump — and those are verified from the outside from the Nike combine,” Grier said. “I’ve got a video of him power cleaning 350 pounds, pretty easily from a full front squat. The kid is special. He blocks and he’s got some of the best hands on our team — we throw it a lot. He can run past you, over you, through you. I just don’t know what else you could look for in a running back.

“He has the complete package and is such a humble, character guy. I felt like I was coaching Tim Tebow. He made me a better person, because of how strong he is and how convicted he is in his faith. He lives that out. A lot of kids and even adults give that lip service — even me. I have very strong faith, but my walk isn’t always where it should be. This is an 18-year old kid whose walk is right in line with his faith. He’s the real deal. He’s a special kid and a special athlete. I think he’s going to do great. I wasn’t surprised at all (with his spring).”

Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson promised Carney an opportunity to compete at running back, where many other coaches looked at him for other positions.

“What don’t you like about him as a running back?” Grier would ask. “What am I missing?

“He had a lot of offers, but unfortunately a lot of teams were looking at him as an athlete. Not enough people were taking him seriously as a running back. There were kids in the area getting 30-40 offers — great kids I’m sure and great players in their own right, but we’d be at camps and see Cade and know he’s simply a better player. Clawson was personally involved in Cade’s recruitment and made Cade a priority. He told Cade that was certainly going to be a shot at running back.”

With an offense that has added a ton of skill players in the last two recruiting classes, Carney still took advantage of his opportunities in the spring and is positioned well to earn noteable playing time in his freshman season.

“Going into it, my thought was that he’s going to be a four-unit special teams guy and maybe the third-down back,” Clawson said at the end of spring football. “Now, you look at what’s he’s done — he’s battling to be our starting tailback. You project a guy to do certain things for you, but then you have him on the field and he does that and a whole lot more.”

Carney’s already built a reputation of having an unbelievable work ethic. Try scheduling an interview with him — even during Christmas ‘break.’ You better be an early riser, because he’s heading to the gym before you usually even wake.

“He loves to play the game and loves to train to play the game. There’s a lot of kid who love to play football, but there’s not a lot of kids that are willing to do what it takes to prepare to be successful playing football. He’s one of those guys,” Grier said. “Cade wants to compete right now, but figured he’d be a situational back (to start). Apparently he’s in the mix. I’m proud of him. He’s going to have a great career. I don’t know if he’ll be All-ACC next year, but it wouldn’t surprise me. Over the course of the next four years, he’s going to do some great things there.”

Carney rushed for more than 1,000 yards and 16 scores at 12-0 state champ Davidson Day last year, but it may have been his off-the-field contributions that helped set him apart.

“He made an impact here last year not just on the field, but off. That team last year was a special group,” Grier said. “On a good weather day, these kids go until it’s dark-dark. With Cade’s leadership, they would go in and do a bible study for an hour-and-a-half after practice. No adults, and he was the one who led that. Pretty special.”

He’s also helped guide other Patriots who are working their way through the recruiting process, including recent Wake Forest quarterback commit Sam Hartman.

“He’s a trustworthy guy that I knew I could rely on to get valuable information from. He said all the right things,” Hartman said. “He said he loved getting up there early. He really talked about how it’s family. He told me the school is hard and they make you work — which is nice. I want to get a good education.”

Hartman also said Carney’s spring emergence at Wake didn’t come as a shock to him.

“I knew that he was going to pop there, with just the way he works. Playing with him last year was an honor. I’d say he’s the best football player I’ve ever played with, all-around — work ethic, attitude, leadership and athletic ability,” he said. “He went hard every play and you know he’s always there for you. If they’re recruiting those type of guys, there’s nothing else I could ask for.”

Davidson Day three-star linebacker Chase Monroe is down to three schools: Wake Forest, Mississippi State and Kentucky.

“He’s a Godly man, and someone you SHOULD have around you. I love Cade, and we got really close the year-and-a-half that he was at Davidson Day,” Monroe said. “He’s always texting me. I’m always looking for his advice about what to do. Yeah, he’s a little biased toward Wake, but he’s really helpful.”

Grier told a story earlier this week about Carney being asked by a school administrator what he wanted to do after his football days were over (presumably many years from now). He said, without any hesitation, that he wanted to build orphanages for homeless children, then maybe serve as a minister.

“That’s what he sees as his life — serving other people,” Grier said.