Brownwood High School senior Matthew McCrane recently received an offer to play football for Kansas State University and made a verbal commitment Monday night.
Special Teams Coach Sean Snyder coached McCrane as a kicker at a summer training camp at KSU and was the one who made the offer to him for a full scholarship to KSU Sunday night via telephone. McCrane stated that Coach Snyder and KSU Head Coach Bill Snyder have made him feel like a top recruit, which was one reason why he accepted the offer. Other schools looked at McCrane but KSU was the one that took special interest and knew his abilities best. These schools included the Air Force Academy, the University of Texas, Texas Tech, Southern Methodist University and Baylor; however he hadn’t received offers other than that of admission to the Air Force Academy and walk on positions at SMU and Baylor where he had been academically accepted.
“It was hard to accept the thought that I wouldn’t be playing for UT, but UT wasn’t the fit for me. I grew up wanting to play there,” McCrane stated. “At UT I was a recruit, but wasn’t treated like I was a top recruit. KSU really took an interest and treated me like a top recruit.”
McCrane stated that KSU wants to start working with him as soon as possible, in fact, he will start classes January 22nd and begin working out with the team as well as try to put some weight on to prepare for the upcoming fall season. KSU has two other kickers, senior Anthony Cantelli will be graduating and hopes are that McCrane will be ready to start in game one of next season.
KSU does play UT mid-season, and that makes it interesting, as McCrane will be playing against other past Brownwood Lions such as Jaxon Shipley and Kevin Vacarro.
McCrane stated that he is still in the process of taking it all in and is very excited about playing at KSU.
“It’s all very surreal. It’s hard to fathom playing for such a big school and how big getting the offer really is from a Big 12 school like KSU,” said McCrane. “It’s going to be crazy when I start there as a freshman.”
His parents, Stephen and Lori McCrane of Brownwood are excited for him; however McCrane stated that it will be hard especially on his mother with him starting classes in the spring semester.
McCrane will come back in May for his graduation from Brownwood High School. Currently, he is academically ranked 22nd out of 190 in his class, according to McCrane.
