Super 16: Harrison's Name Will Be Called Often This Season

LAKELAND | Kerwin Harrison cost Irving Strickland a dinner, but the Kathleen head coach isn't complaining. His reward: a Division-I caliber tight end on his roster.

Harrison, a 6-foot-3, 230-pound senior tight end is something of a late bloomer. He went out for football after his freshman year, stayed one week, then quit. Then he came back last summer. 

"I told one of the coaches, ‘I bet you dinner he doesn't last,'" Strickland said. "He said, ‘Why not.' I said because he doesn't like to work. I ended up having to take the coach out to dinner."

Harrison said running back Terry Bentley chastised him every day in school about not playing football, and that's what made him come out again.

"He needed to play," Bentley said. "I played against him in little league, and I knew he could play. I hate to see talent go to waste."

Harrison's talents are being pursued by USF, Louisville, Texas Tech, FAU, FIU, Iowa State and Rutgers. This year, he is one of PolkPreps' Super Sixteen selections, a list of the top 16 rising seniors in Polk County.

Initially, Harrison's first preference when he came back was to be a linebacker, but Strickland had other ideas.

"I'm telling you right now, if you play tight end, you're going to be able to go to school wherever you want if you take care of business in the classroom," Strickland recalled telling Harrison. "He looked at me all crazy."

Strickland gave Harrison a proposition: Play tight end in the spring, if you don't like it, you can move to defense. 

It didn't matter. Harrison enjoyed playing tight end. Harrison didn't begin the season as a starter, but in the first game against Jesuit, he caught some passes and scored a touchdown. When the coaches watched video of the game on Sunday, they realized he needed to be on the field all the time.

Strickland didn't make it easy on Harrison when he came out the second time, riding him hard at practice. 

"It was kind of funny, but I needed it," said Harrison.

"It gives you a little more push — the yelling, all of that. It puts you through a test. He calls me Kerwin every day. Everybody calls me K.T. but he said I had to earn my name."

And now?

"He still calls me Kerwin," Harrison said laughing.