Every other week during the football season, Erasmus Hall star senior quarterback Wayne Morgan, the most highly touted football player in New York City, takes us into his life and times. In this exclusive NYPost.com diary, Morgan, ranked in the top 150 in the country by scouting services, details everything from practices and games to recruiting, as told to Marc Raimondi.
That win Saturday against Boys & Girls was huge. There was no way we were going to go 0-2. We knew we had two more hard games coming up against DeWitt Clinton and Tottenville. We needed that win to boost our confidence.
Saturday’s game is against Clinton. Everybody on the team hates Clinton because they beat us last year in the first round of the playoffs — sending our seniors home earlier than expected. We weren’t supposed to lose that game.
So this weekend, everybody on the team is just going to out and give it all they’ve got. You’re going to see it. It’s going to be way different than Boys & Girls. When we play we’re going to let it all out.
We’re not really changing our strategy. We’re doing the same thing we did last week. Clinton is strong. Every year we played them, they’re strong. They have athletes, so we have to be fast.
I like our new hurry-up offense because it tires the other teams out. And we can handle it, because we are in shape. We run hard every day, so when the other teams are tired in the fourth quarter, we’re not.
The skill players look at the board on the sidelines, see what we have to do. Me and the running backs communicate to the linemen how to block. Defenses won’t know what plays we’re running even if we call it out. The names of the plays are a secret — I can’t tell you them, or Coach will kill me.
The schedule has been hard so far. But I’d rather have a hard schedule than get to the playoffs and go against a much tougher team. Now we’ll know what it’ll be like in the playoffs.
Coach Anselmo from Syracuse called me the other day to see how the game went. Syracuse is still high up on my list of colleges. I have to get up there to a game. They played USC on Saturday night, but I couldn’t watch because I don’t have the cable channel.
South Carolina is coming to see me play against Fort Hamilton (on Oct. 22). I haven’t set up any visits yet. I’m waiting until after the season. Nothing has really changed with recruiting.
In January, I’m playing in the new Semper Fidelis All-American Bowl, run by the Marines. A lot of the guys I was talking to in Oregon (at the Nike Opening event in July) are playing in that game. It’s at Chase Field in Arizona and we’re getting to go to three college bowl games in three nights.
I wanted to be different, because I know Ishaq Williams and Dominique Easley went to the Army game.
Check back with Wayne Morgan every other Wednesday during the season. His next diary entry will appear on Oct. 12.
