Colleges

USF buddy system

Longtime friends Carlton Williams and Cedric Hill help each other as they help the Bulls.

By GREG AUMAN, Times Staff Writer
Published November 8, 2007

USF safety Carlton Williams got his longtime friend Cedric Hill to come to the Bulls.
	[Daniel Wallace | Times]

ADVERTISEMENT [Jim Damaske | Times] Cedric Hill, scoring against UCF, played with Carlton Williams at Valdosta High in Georgia. The juniors are rare out-of-state Bulls.

TAMPA - They have established themselves on opposite sides of the football field, and yet you might not find two closer players in USF's locker room.

Strong safety Carlton Williams and tight end Cedric Hill have emerged as vocal but humble leaders as juniors, trying to help the Bulls stop the disheartening momentum of a three-game losing streak. Without each other, neither might be in a Bulls uniform.

"When I first came to school here, I didn't know anybody, and I was thinking about leaving," said Williams, who played with Hill at Valdosta High in Georgia, about 20 miles from the Florida border. "It was unfamiliar to me. I wasn't comfortable. Toward the end of the semester, when I had talked Ced into coming here, that made me feel a whole lot better."

Hill and Williams were captains on Valdosta's 2003 team, which lost in the state championship game. Hill signed with Miami, but the Hurricanes asked him to defer his enrollment until January 2005. While waiting that fall, Hill heard a lot about the Bulls from Williams and eventually requested a release from Miami, joining his friend on scholarship at USF that spring.

Williams, 6-foot-4 and 214 pounds, started 12 games as a redshirt freshman in 2005, totaling 66 tackles and being honored as USF's Rookie of the Year. He added nine starts as a sophomore and has started every game this fall, with 54 tackles and 5.5 for losses, making him one of the Bulls' most experienced underclassmen.

Hill, 6-3 and 230, has come along more slowly, starting four games at receiver as a freshman and finishing with 10 catches. He had 11 as a tight end last season, and stepped in as a full-time starter this fall. He has a career-best 13 catches, including a touchdown, but he's also embraced blocking more, adding 10 pounds to reach his current weight of 230.

"I wasn't the biggest tight end, so I was 'Catch the ball, catch the ball, catch the ball,'" Hill said. "In the summer, I worked on my blocking techniques. If I block well, it sets up passes for me. I always want the ball, but I've got to block well for my teammates, spring them into the end zone."

They have helped each other throughout their time at USF, studying together, going over plays on a dry-erase board, giving each other rides when needed. They call each other cousins, though there's no blood relation, just a friendship since childhood.

"Nothing comes between us," Hill said. "If he's in need and I have something, it's his, and he does the same for me. We have so much love for each other, and I appreciate him for helping me throughout my career."

On a roster where only nine players hail from outside Florida, they have been each other's support system and kept the other from ever feeling like an outsider.

"I can't even put it into words," Williams said. "With him being here, it's like having a brother. Since we were little, we've always played sports together, so it's special to come to college with one of your best friends."

Together they've taken on roles as leaders, on a team that has strong senior leaders, such as cornerbacks Mike Jenkins and Trae Williams and linebacker Ben Moffitt.

"Sometimes, you need somebody to be a vocal leader on a team," Williams said. "I don't think I deserve that role, but I accept it. When things aren't going well, I try to bring some excitement in there."

The loss at Connecticut was especially hard for Hill, who was flagged for a holding penalty on what would have been a tying touchdown in the fourth quarter, then dropped another potential score two plays later. Still, he came off the team bus to address the game with the media, something other team leaders have declined to do after losses.

"You have to suffer through the good with the bad," Hill said. "It was a tough loss. We had it and it slipped through our fingers. It meant a lot after a big loss like that to be a leader and talk for my teammates. I knew all of them were hurting."

Leavitt called on his veteran players to talk to the team last week, two days before the loss to Cincinnati, and Williams told his teammates he needed to see more emotion.

"I basically said that I've never been used to losing, It's not a feeling you should get used to. Especially from a defensive standpoint, we weren't playing with enough emotion," Williams said. "You have to learn how to battle through adversity, and right now it's hitting us pretty hard right now. We have to stay strong and keep fighting."

[Last modified November 7, 2007, 20:13:58]