Interview with Billy Schweitzer
Billy Schweitzer, a 6-2, 200-pound rising senior quarterback at St. Stephen's High School in Alexandria, Virginia committed to Virginia in early August. His coach, Gary Schnell, was kind enough to offer up this interview. Coach Schnell aswered the first few questions, followed by his QB.
Coach Schnell, what are your expectations for this upcoming year for the team?
What was your league record last year?
Coaching in the IAC, you saw a lot of Bryson Spinner, what do you think of him as a player?
Do you see any areas for him to improve this year?
What is the one thing that Billy possesses right now, what is his best attribute?
How did you think that the recruiting process went for Billy?
Billy, when did you make your decision, and what were the key factors in helping you decide?
Have you been down to visit unofficially, or with friends?
Have you been keeping up at all with the Stadium Expansion project?
How would you say your injury affected you last year? What would you say the biggest effect was?
Has the injury affected your preparation this year at all?
What are your expectations for the season, both for the team, and individually?
What are your feelings about the recruiting process, and how is your relationship with Coach Price?
What do you hope to accomplish on and off the field when you get to UVa?
Have you spoken with Coach Tranquill, Coach Welsh in addition to Coach Price?
Are you planning on visiting any games this season?
How would you describe yourself as a player, if you had to choose one adjective?
What are some of your other interests?
Chris MacAulay, The Sabre, August 24th, 1999
The biggest expectation is to make a major improvement over last year, we felt that we needed to get ourselves stronger, and the kids have been working out real hard this summer. I think that we're looking to be very competitive, take one game at a time, and actually looking for a very good season.
In the league we were 0-4.
I saw him for three years, and I think last year as a senior, I thought he was one of the most exciting football players I've seen, he's an impact player, he's just a really really good football player. Actually that didn't have any kind of impact on Billy's decision or thought process. Billy knew Bryson was going there, you've got to compete. Billy likes UVa, he likes the football program, he likes their coaches and he's going to go in there and try and compete with whoever is lined up at quarterback. He knows that for the four or five years he's there that they are going to try and bring someone in better than him, and its all about competition.
He played with a cast on his wrist the whole year. I think that the things that we are going to continue to work on this summer into the next season will be making the right reads, distributing the football to the proper receivers. I'm going to give him a little more ability to change plays if he can handle it. We're going to start that way, and we're going to see what he can do. He's very coachable, he's smart, and I think he has an understanding of what I want him to do. We are going to try to expand his mental preparation for the game plan, and give him more and more, as long as he can handle it, and we won't know that until he tries to do it a couple of times.
Tough. He stood in there and took a lot of hits. We were really young on the offensive line, and he made some throws with people in his face, didn't back down, and got back up and was ready to do it again, and he did that all year. He's really tough and a competitor.
A lot quicker than we thought it was going to go, to be honest with you. You know, when I talked to Billy as a sophomore, we talked about the possibility of playing college football. I don't think he believed me; he was maybe 6-2/140 at the time, skinny little kid. But he humored me at the time, shook his head and said 'yeah, let's give it a shot'. After last year, we didn't have a great year, record wise, we were very disappointed. I don't think he felt with the type of season we had that people were really going to look at him. But he's 6-4/200, he played last year at 185, so he's gained 15 pounds, we put a film together, and he had a couple of schools he was interested in. We only sent the film to about six or seven schools, UVa being one of them. Kentucky, Boston College, Illinois, Marshall, and West Virginia. They all liked him a lot, and UVa was the first to make him a verbal offer, and he thought about it, and decided he really like the school. I mean it was over before it started, really. We weren't expecting it to happen this quickly. I sat down with the parents, and explained about how you get 5 official visits, and they're going to put pressure on you to make a decision, and this that and the other thing, and none of that ever happened.
I made my decision about a week and a half ago (July 29), and the reason I made my decision was, I had all these other schools, and they were all really interested. Two major factors were, first off, its close enough so my parents, and all these people who have helped me get into college, Coach Schnell, and our weightlifting coach, and our trainer, gives them a chance to come down, its two hours away, watch some football at Virginia, and its probably one of the best academic schools I was looking at, and that's a major factor.
Yes, I've been down. I've seen probably ten or twelve games down there.
Yes, the coaches have been telling me about it, and I saw it while I was at the UVa football camp.
First off, it hurt the entire season. Second, I just couldn't do certain things that would've helped the team, even the little things. And the mental aspect, every time I fell, it killed. Just get back up, I guess.
No, not at all. 100% healed.
For the team, we're trying to win the championship. That's our goal every year. This year we've been up here every morning at 8am, 35 guys, lifting, running, doing everything. We put the work in this summer. Hopefully it will pay off, our attitude is we want to go 11-0, win the IAC and win the State Championship. That's my personal goal; I really don't care about how many yards, or any of that stuff, just as long as we win.
Coach Price is a great guy. As far as the process, it's incredible. You're talking to these teams that you've been watching on TV for ten years, since you were a little kid. All of a sudden they're coming to ask you to play football at their school; it's overwhelming. Finally, it just got, it never really got real serious, to where I was taking the official visits and the pressure, because I didn't want it to get that way. I knew where I wanted to go to school, and as soon as I was offered, I was like, “that's the place for me”.
I want to start, hopefully, pretty soon. I want to go down there and compete, that's what I like about it down there. Bryson's there, I know he's really good; I want to go compete at a place like that. Plus, they're a top 25 team every year, and the coaches' goal is they want to win a National Championship in the next couple of years.
I've talked to Coach Welsh once or twice on the phone. I met Coach Tranquill when I was down there, and I'll speak to them more when they can start calling, September 1st.
They want me come down to at least a couple. I'll come down to as many as I can.
Tough.
I love sports, all of them. As far as school, I have no idea what I want to major in.
