Story on his transfer:
http://www.newcanaannewsonline.com/...star-Collins-transferring-to-TCU-11176508.php
When former New Canaan quarterback
Michael Collins informed his high school coach,
Lou Marinelli, that he would be transferring from
the University of Pennsylvania to TCU this upcoming season, he didn’t exactly get the reaction he was expecting.
“When he first told me, I told him he was crazy,” Marinelli said. “They insinuated he was going to be the guy at Penn. If he didn’t get hurt, he’d be a 30-game starter in the Ivy’s; if you were going to go to the NFL or beyond, you can do it from there, but I think he wanted more of a football experience.”
That’s exactly what Collins wanted.
While he didn’t dislike Penn, Collins wants life at a big-time football school.
“I didn’t want to look back and say, ‘what if I had played at the FBS level?’” Collins said. “That was really it, I wanted more of a football experience than I was getting at Penn and a chance to play against the best competition possible.”
With that, comes competing against high-level talent for a spot. In 2017, TCU returns senior
Kenny Hill, and behind him sits impressive freshman
Shawn Robinson—an early enrollee who has wowed coaches at spring practices.
It’s no secret that it will be an uphill climb for Collins to earn a spot, and while staying at Penn may have been the easier decision, he’d rather challenge himself than rest on his laurels.
“I knew I was going to have to compete wherever I went, and at Penn I would be able to probably start,” Collins said. “But I could have gotten injured there and my football career would have been over, so I at least wanted to say I took the chance. If I end up sitting behind somebody so be it, at least I went for it.”
Collins leaves next week for Fort Worth, and will be joining a familiar face already in the program. Offensive tackle
Lucas Niang, who played at New Canaan with Collins, is penciled in as the starting right tackle for the Horned Frogs.
It was during Niang’s recruitment to TCU that Collins originally was introduced to the program.
“It is special, and they’re special kids,” Marinelli said of having two of his former constituents in the program. “They’ve worked hard to get where they are, Lucas Niang at this point is 6-foot-7, 340 pounds. He’s out running on our field right now, Michael is excited to be with him.”
Collins built a relationship with TCU quarterback coach
Sonnie Cumbie—a former walk-on at
Texas Tech—and was attracted to the program partially because it runs the same spread-offense he had ran at New Canaan.
In that system, Collins set the state record for touchdown passes in a season with 54, and matched it with nine in one game against Trumbull.
Those numbers could have been even more inflated had he played in the second-half of the majority of contests.
At Penn as a freshman, Collins only threw two passes—both of which he completed.
“Coming up in high school I thought he was capable of playing (at the FBS level), but he never got the big offer that he really wanted,” Marinelli said. “By the time he went to Penn, he was behind (
Alek Torgersen), who was All-Ivy and got drafted and he felt he was as good as him. So, he just wanted to go to a big-time school and see how he does.
“He knows he’s going to have to compete.”
aparelli@bcnnew.com @reportedbytheAP
