Seeking the big stage
A.J. Green is one of the young cornerbacks likely to see lots of playing time for the Cowboys.
ASTILLWATER — .J. Green lights up at the mention of high school football in his home state of Texas.
He smiles as he pontificates about the splendid talent. The grand stadiums. The raucous crowds. The intense rivalries.
But as the Oklahoma State cornerback talks, he keeps coming back to what he loved most — unrelenting, unforgiving pressure.
“You’re on the platform,” he says. “You have to show up.”
He did then.
He expects to now. Green is one of the young cornerbacks expected to play big roles this season for the Cowboys. Those inside the program say that even if he’s not a starter right away — though that’s widely expected — he’s a star in the making.
But for now, he’s an inexperienced youngster. He’s a true sophomore. He’s played an extremely limited number of snaps in the secondary. He’s made his biggest contribution to this point on special teams. But on a team whose championship aspirations likely will be determined by the defense, the pressure is on.
Green is undeterred — and it goes back to those high school days.
He transferred before his sophomore year of high school in the DallasFort Worth area from Duncanville to nearby powerhouse DeSoto. His new school had a football team filled with college recruits and star players. Nothing was promised the tall and lean teen. Not a varsity spot much less a starting role.
“He was a skinny rascal,” DeSoto defensive coordinator Mark Howeth said, chuckling, of a guy who’s bulked up to his current 6-foot-1, 180 pounds. “I worried if he was strong enough to play the position, but he had so much spunk about him that he overcame a whole lot of that with his attitude and persistence.
“Guys like that catch your eye.”
Howeth made him a starter as a sophomore, and what Green lacked in experience, he more than made up for with his competitiveness. He wanted the high stakes. He loved the big spotlight. He sought the tough assignment.
“The tougher it got,” Howeth said, “the better he liked it.”
Green had arguably the best game of his high school career against arguably one of the greatest high school teams of all time. Allen High not only went three years without a loss but also steamrolled opponents in the process. Led by current Oklahoma
reserve quarterback Kyler Murray and filled with a bunch of other major-college recruits, Allen was a force.
DeSoto met those Murray-led Allen teams in the state playoffs in Green’s sophomore and junior seasons, and after a masterpiece of a game in 2013, the teams met again in 2014 at Jerry World.
The first two levels of the massive Dallas Cowboys’ stadium were packed.
For a high school game.
But the game lived up to the hype as DeSoto held Murray and Allen in check like none other. Allen managed only 25 points, its lowest total in more than three years, and Murray completed just seven passes, a low mark in his high school career.
Murray’s big target that season was Jalen Guyton, then a Notre Dame commitment.
He had one catch that day.
A.J. Green was covering him.
Even though Allen gutted out a 25-22 victory over DeSoto, Green caught as many of Murray’s passes as Guyton did that day. Green had an interception when he wrenched the ball out of Guyton’s hands as they fell to the turf.
“That was a big-time moment for me,” said Green, who was twice first-team all-district, no small feat in talentrich, big-class schools in DFW.
Cowboy Nation hopes there are more highlights to come.
Even though the coaches like what they have in Green and the rest of the young cornerbacks — like them enough, if fact, to have moved the most seasoned returning corner, Ramon Richards, to safety — consternation remains. How will Green and Co. handle a couple of early road games in non-conference play? How will they manage the pass-happy offenses of the Big 12?
All that remains to be seen.
But this much is sure — A.J. Green is embracing the unrelenting, unforgiving pressure just like he always has.
“You’re gonna get tested,” Howeth said. “If you’re one of those kids that flinches, you’re going to have a problem.
“He was never a flincher.”