Bucknell University Athletics
When Healthy, Wilson Brings Success to the Football Field
10/24/2007 8:00:00 AM | Football
Oct. 24, 2007
By Jon Terry, Bucknell Athletic Communications
It was in Burger King, of all places, where Terrance Wilson knew something was horribly wrong.
It was September of 2005, and Wilson had just made his first collegiate start at quarterback for Bucknell in the season opener against Georgetown. Still smarting from a heartbreaking overtime loss to the Hoyas earlier in the evening, Wilson and his parents stopped by the local fast-food eatery for a late meal. During the first half of the game, Wilson's helmet had become dislodged during a scramble for a loose ball, and he took a cleat from a Hoyas defender to the side of his unprotected face. The blow left him sore, but Wilson gutted it out and finished the game. But now, the first bite into his Whopper left him in excruciating pain.
After a sleepless night, Wilson bolted to the team medical staff first thing Sunday morning, and x-rays revealed a fractured jaw. The bright-eyed sophomore was told his season would be over after just one game.
The unfortunate break is but one chapter in the topsy-turvy football career of Terrance Wilson. Injury woes have defined the valleys, but the peaks have been significant and rewarding as well. Now a senior, Wilson is just trying to enjoy every minute of what's left of his crazy ride.
A three-sport standout in football, basketball and track at Hamilton West High School in Trenton, New Jersey, the son of Todd and Diana Wilson initially thought basketball would be his ticket to college athletics. An ankle injury kept him out for much of his junior football season, but he exploded as a senior, when he was named area Player of the Year by both the Trenton Times and the Trentonian.
Knowing he wanted a college that combined strong academics with Division I athletics, Wilson drew attention from most of the Patriot League football programs. A great deal of that interest came from Bucknell, where Tim Landis had just arrived as head coach and installed his spread option offense. Wilson, a speed-burner who came from a strong running program in high school, thought Bucknell's new offense provided the best fit.
As a rookie in 2004, he served as an understudy to First Team All-Patriot League quarterback Daris Wilson (no relation), who rushed for 17 touchdowns and over 1,100 yards while leading the Bison to a 7-4 season. That year, Terrance Wilson also had a chance to start three games for the junior varsity, and he rushed for 335 yards and five touchdowns against three major-conference player factories. Including a series of electrifying runs, he had 155 yards and two scores in a rare victory over Lackawanna College, 100 yards and a score on only 11 carries in a win over Stevens Tech and 80 yards and two touchdowns on 11 carries against Milford Academy.
"I was very excited just to be playing college football," Wilson recalls of that initial taste. "Coach [Brent] Thompson helped me out a lot. We spent hours together in the film room working on option reads. Once it clicked, I had it. The jayvee games helped me out a lot getting used to the speed of the game, and the coaches trusted me to run the offense, so they opened up the playbook."
With the starting quarterback job available the following season, Wilson worked harder than ever on his game that offseason. He took a summer job on campus and worked out religiously in the weight room. He gained about 15 pounds and greatly improved his throwing mechanics.
Given the promise he showed during the jayvee games, and with his hard work in the summer, Wilson was a fairly obvious choice to take over as the starter in 2005. But that fateful season opener against Georgetown confirmed the capriciousness of sports.
Wilson looked great early, leading the Bison on four scoring drives en route to a 16-0 lead. He rushed for 83 yards and hit a couple of timely passes. But the offense stagnated after the kick to the head, Bucknell turned the ball over four times, and Georgetown rallied to win in overtime. The Bison lost two more quarterbacks in the next two weeks, and suddenly a once-promising season spiraled to 1-10.
For Wilson, the broken jaw caused more than just what he describes as, "the most pain I've ever felt in my life." Because the lower jaw was wired and he could not eat solid food for about six weeks, all of the offseason conditioning went in reverse. Wilson says he lost about 30 pounds following the injury, meaning that even if the jaw had been healed before the end of the year, there was no possible way he could have returned to playing shape.
In 2006, Navy transfer Andrew Lair came in and won the starting job in preseason camp, but Lair was sidelined with a hip injury just before halftime of the season opener against Duquesne, and this time Wilson came off the bench and played the role of hero.
After the Dukes rallied to take a 28-21 lead in the fourth quarter, the Bison faced 4th-and-11 from the Duquesne 15-yard line with only 13 seconds remaining. Wilson dropped back to pass, but unable to find an open receiver he darted out of the backfield, found a clearing along the left sideline and dove across the goal line with no time showing on the clock. The miraculous play sent the game into overtime, where Bucknell won it 31-28 on a Will Carney field goal.
"Coming off the injury, it felt great just to get back on a football field and play, but then to make a play like that to send the game into overtime, and then to win the game after we lost in overtime [on opening night] the year before, it was just a great feeling," Wilson says.
In Week 4 at Richmond, Lair went down permanently with a broken collarbone. Wilson again came on in relief and led two fourth-quarter scoring drives in a loss to the Spiders, and a week later he was on the way to leading the Bison to a blowout victory at Marist, when disaster struck again.
"I scrambled out of the pocket and was running down the sideline," Wilson remembers of the play that ended with yet another season-ending injury. "As I was tackled I fell on my side, and then all of his weight rolling over on me broke the collarbone and tore ligaments in my shoulder."
Incredibly, when Wilson came out of the game, he didn't even know the collarbone was broken. He initially complained to the athletic training staff about the AC joint in his left shoulder. When they cut his jersey off and removed the shoulder pads, they saw his collarbone sticking out on the right side. That was the first time he noticed it.
Faced with the lingering thought of "not again!", Wilson channeled his energy into helping his new close friend, then-freshman quarterback Marcello Trigg, learn on the fly. With Lair and Wilson out, the job belonged to the rookie. With plenty of encouragement from Wilson, Trigg helped the Bison win four of their last seven games and finish the season with a winning record at 6-5.
"It was very satisfying to see one of my friends do well, even if I couldn't be the one out there," remarks Wilson. "I just told him to keep his head and let his instincts take over."
Trigg's successful late-season audition made for an interesting preseason battle at the quarterback position, and the youngster earned the opening-day start and led the Bison to victory at Duquesne. But despite opening the year No. 3 on the depth chart, Wilson continued mentoring his friend while still working hard at his own game.
"It's friendly competition," says Wilson. "Since we're such close friends, we can go out and play and joke with each other. We make each other better. When one of us comes back to the sideline, we talk to each other about what we see and what we can do better. Every time one of us goes out we do a little handshake, and then we do it when we come back. We're having fun out there."
Wilson saw his first extended playing time of the season in the second half of a loss to Richmond on Sept. 22, and he scored a 39-yard touchdown run. A week later against Marist at home, Landis elevated him into a platoon role with Trigg, and Wilson responded with touchdown runs of 43 and 56 yards en route to a career-high 108-yard day.
As the evening temperatures begin to dip, signaling the waning of another football season, Wilson's future plans are beginning to come into focus. A Patriot League Academic Honor Roll member who earned a terrific 3.75 grade-point average last spring, the management major hopes to go to work for one of his uncles following graduation. One uncle works for Turner Sports in Atlanta, where Wilson interned last summer, and the other works in marketing for Coors in North Carolina. A move to Wall Street is another possibility.
For now, though, the senior is happy to once again be figuring heavily in the team's plans for the remainder of the 2007 season.
