Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Leopards grad lands on D-I team

By DAVID MURPHY
Published January 4, 2007

BROOKSVILLE - As a senior at Hernando in 2005, Windham Rotunda was devastated when he failed to qualify academically to play football as a freshman in college. Two years later, it looks like the best thing that could have happened.

After spending a couple of seasons at a junior college in California working on improving his grades and his size, Rotunda has signed a scholarship to play at Division I-A Troy University in Alabama.

"I'm real excited," said Rotunda, a 6-foot-2, 322-pound interior lineman who will play center at Troy. "I had a lot of schools recruiting me ...but Troy seemed to be the most on the ball. They let me know they needed my position."

Rotunda, whose younger brother Taylor was a junior linebacker/lineman on this year's Hernando team and whose father is former professional wrestler Mike Rotunda, won the state 275-pound wrestling title as a senior. But football remained his true love.

A starter for the Leopards, Rotunda said he was recruited by some Division I schools as a senior but failed to qualify academically to play as a freshman.

Rotunda enrolled at College of the Sequoias, a junior college in Visalia, Calif, in between Fresno and Modesto at the foot of the Sequoia National Forest, and immediately began attacking the weight room. He knew he had to improve two things: his weight and his grades.

"He came to us at 255, 260 pounds," said College of the Sequoias offensive coordinator Andy Siegal, a former assistant coach at Pasco High from 1990-92. "I kept giving him a hard time, saying, "What are you going to do, play fullback for us?' "

Siegal said Rotunda's dedication in the weight room eventually brought his playing weight up to 320. As a freshman, Rotunda rotated with All-American Ofa Mohetau. When Mohetau moved on to Texas Tech, Rotunda took over as the full-time starter at left guard.

He said he visited Troy three weeks ago and decided he wanted to play for the Trojans, who beat Rice 41-17 in the New Orleans Bowl on Dec. 23.

"The team is like a family," Rotunda said.

He will enroll at the school for the spring semester, but is undecided on a major.

David Murphy can be reached at dmurphy@sptimes.com or 352 848-1407.

[Last modified January 3, 2007, 20:11:35]