A Size Too Small : Joe Zacharia and Cary Grant Have Found the Leap to Division I Blocked by Recruiters Who Measure Desirability in Inches, Pounds

One word constantly crops up in conversations about how Joe Zacharia and Cary Grant played high school football last season: Big.

They were catalysts, making the big plays that led to big wins.

Give Grant the ball and watch him explode.

Line up Zacharia at nose guard and watch the opposing offense implode.

The two seniors were dynamite. Not surprisingly, their teams won conference championships.

After the season, though, Zacharia and Grant were ignored. Recruiters for Division I colleges, after studying game films and figures, dismissed both players with one word: Small.

It didn’t matter that Zacharia had helped Canyon High to an unbeaten season by being a head-banger who played with heavy mettle.

It didn’t matter that he sums up his approach to the game by saying: “I look at an opponent and want to tear his head right off. It may be 100 degrees or wet and smelling like crap. But you stick it out because it’s your job to win.”

It didn’t matter that Canyon Coach Harry Welch had told recruiters: “Joe plays football with total involvement. Spiritually, he is at another level.”

None of that mattered. Zacharia is 6-0 and 210 pounds, which isn’t considered large enough for a major college defensive lineman.

The same goes for Grant. Sure, he is a versatile ball carrier whose shifty moves freeze opponents in their tracks.

Sure, he sums up his approach to the game by saying: “Game-breaking plays are my responsibility. When I have the ball, I try to make something special happen.”

Sure, Jim Brownfield, Grant’s coach at Muir High, told recruiters: “Cary was our wild card. He played every skill position except quarterback, and played each one at a championship level.”

But college coaches shrugged. Grant is 5-7 and 155 pounds, which is considered too small for a major college wide receiver.

“They don’t have the size, it’s that simple,” said Dick Laguens, recruiting coordinator at USC.

Height, weight and speed are the first criteria major colleges consider when they chart prospects, Laguens said. And there is no column on the chart for heart.

“Joe and Cary could both play Division I football,” Welch said. “But neither will have a chance. And that is a real shame.”

Said Brownfield: “We exaggerated the sizes of our kids on the program because everyone on the team was small. On film, Cary probably looked 5-10, 180. But when coaches came in to meet him, you could tell by the look on their faces. They were shocked.”

Grant noticed the reaction by recruiters. “Coaches from Cal, Colorado and Hawaii came to Muir to talk to me,” he said. “I could see it in their eyes. They were looking at my height rather than at me.”

Despite being small, both players had plenty of reason to believe they would be offered scholarships by major colleges.

Grant was most valuable player at last year’s prestigious Watts Summer Games. In 20 games, he caught 171 passes for 2,037 yards and 35 touchdowns. All were Watts Summer Games records.

“Coach Brownfield told me, ‘The way you played, you’re going to get a Division I full ride,’ ” Grant said.

The regular season was capped by Muir’s 28-14 victory over Hart in the Coastal Conference final. Grant broke the game open with a 65-yard touchdown catch, his ninth score in four playoff games.

Zacharia embodied in spirit and performance the rough-and-tumble Cowboys, who hold the third-longest win streak in the United States.

“It sounds crazy, but I’d dream the night before a game of ambulances circling the field,” Zacharia said. “Not that I’d really want anyone to get hurt, but when a team played the Canyon Cowboys, they knew there would be bone-crunching tackles.”

After excelling in the playoffs his junior season, Zacharia set his sights on a scholarship. “At the beginning of this season, I got to practice early and stayed late,” he said. “I wanted to have a sterling year, be unstoppable. I figured I’d be contacted by schools like USC and UCLA.”

Interestingly, Grant, and possibly Zacharia, will attend Cal Lutheran University. CLU is small, but has been highly successful in football--much like Grant and Zacharia.

The Kingsmen were 6-5 last season, their first year of Division II competition, but have compiled a 166-55-6 record in 23 years in the NAIA. Grant has signed a letter of intent and Zacharia is taking classes that will qualify him for a scholarship in June.

“We slip in on two or three every year who are passed over by major colleges,” Cal Lutheran Coach Bob Shoup said.

Before CLU came to the rescue, though, Zacharia and Grant rode an emotional roller coaster. For the first time, they doubted their abilities.

The two players cursed the colleges that had spurned them. And in the privacy of their bedrooms, they did what strong football players aren’t supposed to do.

“I cried and cried and cried,” Grant said. “The day Coach Brownfield leveled with me about why I got no attention, I walked home with my girlfriend. When we got home, I broke down. It was the first time I’d cried in front of her.”

Grant felt that fate had been particularly cruel because his 15-year-old sister, Angela, is 5-10 and his father is 6-1.

“Colleges couldn’t accept me for my abilities,” he said. “Why do they only look at my size?”

After refusing to believe that his size would deter recruiters, Zacharia finally was convinced about a month after the season ended.

“When it hit me that I wasn’t going anywhere, I went into a deep depression for about three weeks,” Zacharia said. “People had tried to tell me that you had to make the chart, but I didn’t believe them. ‘You’re crazy,’ I said. ‘If you’re good, they’ll take you no matter how small you are.’

“I found out the hard way it wasn’t true.”

Welch said there is no easy way to break the news to players like Zacharia and Grant.

“They both have exceptional drive, inner desire and a world of confidence.” he said. “They know nothing except how to succeed and excel. They had to be hurting.”

The initial shock was followed by resentment.

“I remember thinking, ‘I’ll show them,’ ” Grant said. “I was very bitter. I thought, ‘The coaches who turned me down, I’ll have them begging for me.’ ”

Said Zacharia: “I lay in bed and wonder why I’m not 6-3.”

Canyon football has a large following in the Santa Clarita Valley. Within the community, Zacharia is a genuine hero, recognized wherever he goes. Every Friday night for two years, he helped provide a happy ending. The fans wanted one more and it just didn’t happen.

“Everywhere I went, people who saw me play would ask me where I was going to school,” Zacharia said. “It was an embarrassment. ‘Is SC talking to you yet, Zach?’ they’d say, or, ‘Where are you going to school, Joe?’ I’d say, ‘I’m not sure.’ I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. I never gave them a false story, though.

“People say things like, ‘It was your size, huh, Zach?’ They’d talk to me and kind of look at the ground. It wouldn’t be the same.”

Ultimately, the families of both players brought them out of their depression.

“My parents and my brothers stayed with me,” Zacharia said. “I wouldn’t talk to them at first because I thought I let them down. No Zacharia has ever gone to college. But my parents would come into my room and say, ‘It’ll get better. Something will come up.’ ”

Despite his size, Zacharia might have been offered a scholarship had his grades been better. His grade point average is over 2.0, the minimum allowed by the NCAA, but not by much.

“Joe is a double question mark to a big school,” said Shoup, the coach at Cal Lutheran. “If he were a valid B student, schools would have taken a chance on him, even though he is small. If he were 6-4, 260, schools would have taken a chance even though he is a C student.”

Cal Lutheran is saving a scholarship for Zacharia on the condition he achieves a B average or better in four college prep courses this semester.

“We’ve made a moral and ethical commitment to him,” Shoup acknowledged.

Zacharia regrets not giving his studies more attention the past four years. “Knuckle down in the classroom and you can have it all,” he said. “I didn’t take school seriously enough. I’m gonna do it now. It’s just taking me a little longer than it should have. If I went into a classroom like it was a football game . . .

“Sports were my No. 1 priority. I don’t know why. It’s always been that way.”

Another drawback in the eyes of recruiters is the position Zacharia plays. He’ll have to prove he can make a successful switch to linebacker at a Division II or junior college before a major school will extend a scholarship offer.

Said Laguens, the USC recruiter: “There are no exceptions for linemen on the size chart. A taller man has too much leverage in head-to-head blocking.”

Although Shoup said that Cal Lutheran would rather have Zacharia remain at nose guard, he will be given an opportunity to play linebacker if he wishes.

“Nose guard is where Joe has had so much success,” Shoup said. “But we allow all freshmen to try out for the position of their choice.”

Said Zacharia: “JC coaches tell me, ‘Play linebacker for us for two years and you’ll be ready for Division I.’ It’s basically a decision between that and going to Cal Lutheran for four years.”

A player from a Division II school may transfer to Division I, but must sit out the first season after transferring. He wouldn’t necessarily lose eligibility, though, because a player has 10 semesters of eligibility from the time he enrolls in college. A junior college player may transfer to a Division I or II school without sitting out a season.

Scholastics and position were no problem for Grant, who carries a 3.2 grade-point average at Muir and recently received a scholar-athlete award from the National Football Foundation. Instead, it was a lack of world-class speed.

“A few major college receivers are under 5-9,” said Laguens. “But they all run a 9.3 100 or better. Speed is the bottom line for a guy that small.”

Grant, who runs a 9.9 100, uses exceptional balance and cutting ability to break off long runs. Shoup plans to use him at wide receiver, kick returner, as a fifth defensive back and possibly tailback.

Zacharia may be debating whether Cal Lutheran is best for him, but Grant sees joining the Kingsmen as his salvation.

“It’s rather ironic,” Grant said. “Just when I decided to look at a Division II school, Coach Shoup called. I took a liking to him just by his voice on the phone. He’s cool and calm. I thought, ‘I want to play football for this man.’

“Cal Lutheran has an excellent academic program. They’ll push me and I’ll get a degree.”

Grant balked at Shoup’s initial offer of a partial scholarship, though.

“I said I wouldn’t sign unless I got a full ride,” Grant said. “I was determined not to sell myself short.

Grant said he has bounced back from the feelings of rejection.

“I’m not bitter to anyone now,” he said. “It wasn’t meant for me to go to a Division I school. It was meant for me to go to Cal Lutheran. I’m a firm believer in that.”

A player who accepts his fate the way Grant has will have the best chance of succeeding in the long run, according to Shoup. “The guy who decides to make the most of the situation is better off than the guy who mopes and pouts because he didn’t get Division I attention,” he said.

Perhaps the most difficult aspect of Division II football for Grant and Zacharia to accept will be the small crowds. Canyon routinely draws 5,000 fans to home games, and Muir drew 12,000 to the Rose Bowl for its yearly clash with rival Pasadena. Cal Lutheran rarely draws more than 2,000 to home games.

“There’s no feeling like hitting somebody and hearing the crowd roar,” Zacharia said.

Although the disappointment of being overlooked lingers, Zacharia is as tenacious in his refusal to give up on himself as he is in refusing to let a ball carrier escape.

“I don’t want people to say I quit or didn’t want it,” he said. “I gave people what they wanted to see every week. I don’t want to be a person who, 10 years from now, says, ‘I’ll never know if I could have made it.’ If I can say I tried my best and just wasn’t good enough, fine.

“Joe Zacharia will be playing football next season.”

Because he is set on beginning a career at Cal Lutheran, Grant is genuinely happy again. He even turned down a recent offer with a laugh.

“My mom offered to take me to a doctor to get enzymes shot into my bone marrow so I’d grow,” Grant said. “She was actually serious. I said, ‘Mom, what are you talking about? I’m happy.’ I don’t need to grow any more.”