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| Connette Tours SoCal Rivals USC and UCLA |
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| As one of the up-and-coming stars in Southern California, Brandon Connette (Corona, Calif./Santiago) is in position to be one of the more highly sought after quarterbacks in the 2010 class.
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Santiago’s signal caller recently brought DeBartolo Sports U up-to-date on recent happenings in his off-season and reveals an early favorite in the recruiting process.
Relegated to a reserve role, Connette spent his sophomore season backing up senior starter, Renny Kruse. With the departure of Kruse, Connette is primed and eager to take the reigns to the Sharks offensive attack.
Yet to start a varsity game at Santiago, Connette has attacked this off-season with a vengeance. Attempting to solidify his spot atop the 2010 quarterback rankings, the rising junior has captured the QB MVP award at the National Underclassman Combine at the Home Depot Center in Carson, the MVP and Skills Competition titles at the Florida Gators Camp, and led Santiago to a 1st-place finish at the USC 7-on-7 Passing Tournament.
After turning in multiple standout performances at Steve Clarkson’s Quarterback Academies to start the summer, DeBartolo Sports University knew it would only be a matter of time before the rest of the high school football industry received word of the 6’2 183 lb rifleman’s skill set.
At the USC 7-on-7 Passing Tournament, under the surveillance of Head Coach, Pete Carroll, and Quarterbacks Coach, Steve Sarkisian, Connette and his Santiago Shark teammates dominated a playing field consisting of other area High Schools such as Carson, L.A. Jordan, Bishop Amat and Loyola to capture first place honors.
“I recall looking over at Pete Carroll and Steve Sarkisian after we scored to see them with their mouths dropped open,” Connette jokes. “There was a stretch where we seemed to be scoring on every single play. In talking with Coach Sarkisian afterwards he said he was definitely impressed with my arm strength, leadership abilities, and overall athleticism. It was at that time he invited me to their Rising Stars camp later that week. Coach Carroll came over to wish me congratulations on winning the camp and said he wanted me to attend as many USC events over the summer as I could. Overall, it was a great day for Santiago and myself.”
On the other side of Los Angeles, Connette visited the UCLA campus during one of the program’s recent summer camps. It was a conversation with Bruins Head Coach, Rick Neuheisel, that has the rising junior seriously contemplating the possibility of wearing the True Blue and Gold colors.
“Coach Neuheisel pulled me and my dad aside after the second practice and asked if we had a list of favorite programs to visit,” explains Connette. “We told him that UCLA was definitely one of the top schools we were looking at. Coach Neuheisal said that was a very good thing because though they just offered (Richard) Brehaut, only one scholarship is offered each year to a quarterback and it’s usually given around this time. He told me that as of right now I was his top guy for the Class of 2010 and he wanted to see me in the Blue and Gold uniform next year. He (Neuheisel) invited me to come out to all the games and said I would be able to come down on the field this year. Being recruited by UCLA should be a really fun experience. They are definitely one of my top choices for college at this point.”
Moving forward, Connette will place less emphasis on the camp circuit and shift his focus towards getting Santiago prepared for the start of the upcoming season.
“I’m going to focus on getting the work in with my team so we can work on building that chemistry with one another,” admits Connette. “To my knowledge there are only a few remaining college camps I plan to attend. For the rest of the summer I plan to re-connect with Steve Clarkson and attend the remaining DeBartolo Sports University events.”
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