Why has Massachusetts become a hot spot for Power Five schools to recruit quarterbacks?
By
Julian E.J. Sorapuru Globe Staff
WESTWOOD — In a few years time, Blake Hebert and Henry Hasselbeck could share the field again, battling it out on a Saturday for the college football teams they’re committed to, Clemson and Michigan State, respectively.
But for now, the quarterbacks take turns dismantling each other’s high school defense in a late August scrimmage between Hebert’s Central Catholic team and Hasselbeck’s Xaverian squad.
On one drive, Hebert unleashes an effortless 40-yard pass to the left pylon. His receiver has a Xaverian defensive back draped all over him, but no matter. Hebert sticks the ball right on his receiver’s back shoulder for a touchdown.
Hasselbeck responds on his next drive. On a read option play, he deceives Central Catholic with a fake handoff, then gets to the second level of the defense in a flash. As the secondary closes in, Hasselbeck bounces the run even farther to the outside and blazes down the sideline on his way to the house.
In the recent past, it’s been rare to have two Massachusetts quarterbacks so highly recruited on the same field. But Hasselbeck and Hebert are part of a new wave of elite talent — along with Dante Reno, Miles O’Neill, and Ryan Puglisi — putting the Bay State, and New England more broadly, on the map as a must-stop destination for recruiters from college football’s powerhouse programs searching for their next quarterback.
Mike McCarthy, the owner of
M2 QB Academy, has been privately training quarterbacks from New England since 2014, including all of the aforementioned blue-chip prospects except Puglisi. McCarthy said getting scholarship offers from teams in the Power Five conferences (SEC, ACC, Pac-12, Big Ten, Big 12) is now “an attainable goal that can be reached in this area, where in the past, that wasn’t the case.
McCarthy said the improvement of quarterback play in New England can be attributed to six factors: stable high school coaching; the rise of private school leagues with the resources to rival states such as Texas, California, and Ohio for talent; increased emphasis on offseason camps and showcases that college coaches all over the country travel to see; the Tom Brady effect — growing up watching one of the game’s great players excel for the Patriots and wanting to emulate that; the growth of private training that allows year-around focus on quarterbacking; and the fact that prospects are training together, pushing each other to be better.
Hebert, who scored 23 touchdowns and made a
Division 1 semifinals appearance last season, and Hasselbeck, who led Xaverian to a 7-4 record before the Hawks fell
to Springfield Central in a D1 quarterfinal, are playing under the Friday night lights of Eastern Massachusetts this season. Reno, O’Neill, and Puglisi all play elsewhere.
The latter three have had somewhat similar career trajectories, starting at Massachusetts schools before transferring to prep schools in other parts of the Northeast.
Reno began at Tantasqua Regional in Fiskdale, where he helped the Warriors to the Division 4 state semifinals as a freshman in 2019, and now plays for Cheshire Academy in Connecticut. O’Neill started at Marblehead, where he threw for more than 2,500 yards, with a 73 percent completion rate, and scored 28 touchdowns before transferring to the Hun School in Princeton, N.J. Puglisi played at Lawrence Academy, then transferred to Avon Old Farms in Connecticut after his sophomore year.
Reno, O’Neill, and Puglisi all said they believed the strength of competition at prep schools would be best for their development, and it seems their transfers have paid off. All three are committed to SEC schools:
Reno to South Carolina,
O’Neill to Texas A&M, and
Puglisi to Georgia.
“I think the Massachusetts public schools are really good,” said Reno. “And I think it’s great for a certain amount of time, but for me, in my development, my career, my dad [Tony Reno] being the head coach at Yale, I was kind of always around the prep schools in Connecticut.
“We have six Power Five kids [at Cheshire Academy]. Guys like that, that you surround yourself with, I think it’s something that you can’t get in the public schools in Massachusetts.”
Reno added that the opportunity to reclassify and gain an extra year of high school eligibility also played a role in his decision to transfer.
The exposure prep schools provide also comes at a premium cost: tens of thousands of dollars a year in tuition and fees, though many football players receive scholarships. So, too, does specialized quarterback instruction and weight training. Several quarterbacks interviewed said this extra work costs their families thousands of dollars a season.
“I’m lucky to have two great parents that have supported me this whole way,” said O’Neill. “It’s an investment when you think about it, because if it pays off, you’re going to college for free.”
While some of the prospects play in different states, they all know each other and are familiar with each other’s skill sets.
“Iron sharpens iron,” said Hasselbeck. “I was here [training] with Blake one time, and it’s not a competition of who can have the better throw, but you’re working hard against each other. It’s so amazing to just see these guys work. They’re incredible players, which pushes me to be a better player.”
Off the field, the quarterbacks have a supportive community built on childhood friendships, social media connections, and rooming together at offseason camps.
“It’s really not about who’s the best from this area, it’s about how can we make each other better?” said Puglisi, who is from Paxton. “And I think when people understood that culture, that’s when it kind of skyrocketed and we started to uplift each other. A lot more people came out of this area because we created this culture of success and excellence.”
Hasselbeck’s father, Matt — who also played quarterback at Xaverian and Boston College before embarking on an 18-year NFL career — said this level of familiarity among competitors is a bit unusual, but not unaccepted.
“They’re sort of just cheering for Massachusetts football, and it’s unique,” said the elder Hasselbeck,
who is the quarterbacks coach at Xaverian. “I know I wasn’t that way. I was rooting against Mark Hartsell at Brockton High when we played him.
“But now I look back, Hartsell was awesome. I should have been cheering him on. I thought of him as Darth Vader or something.”
A review of online forums dedicated to the college football teams these quarterbacks are committed to showed that Massachusetts football is gaining new admirers among those fan bases. Those in the know believe Massachusetts quarterbacks garnering national recognition is not a blip, but the dawn of a new era.
“The culture of quarterback play in the area is just at such a great spot right now,” said McCarthy. “[College] coaches are seeing that there is such a higher quality of football being played in New England now and there’s a lot more eyes on us.”
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