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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 2, 2003)
} tation i ^ SM on account tudent ID to nd Sony a re The Sports The Battalion Page IB • Tuesday, September 2. 2003 road less traveled After a year in anonymity, A&M A-back Carter is finally starting to see the field By True Brown THE BATTALION t he pain shows in Jason Carter’s eyes when he talks about last sea son. I While the Texas A&M football team struggled to a 6-6 record in 2002, »rter spent most of the season in the sf idows, trying to decide what his Hture in football would be. I The junior from Caldwell, now a pi nt returner and A-back for the ■ggies, entered last season vying for playing time at quarterback, a position ■here the Aggies had a surplus of tal- Bit. However, Carter’s name wasn’t at Be top of a list that included the expe- rit nee of then-senior Mark Farris or the h' iie of then-freshman Reggie McNeal. I As a partial qualifier. Carter couldn’t play in 2001, but he earned offensive semit team MVP honors during the sea- Kn. As 2002 rolled around, a large question mark loomed over A&M’s (Iiarterback job. Former coach R.C. Slocum started Farris in the season Opener against the University of Lmisiana-Lafayette, but Farris soon giive way to Dustin Long and Reggie McNeal. I Carter finally saw action on the Aggies’ last drive of the game, and, ck spite leading the team in rushing dur ing the game with 42 yards on three Brries, he found himself stuck as the ifurth man in A&M’s QB rotation. I As the season progressed, Carter saw sporadic action returning kicks and punts but wasn’t on the field with A&M’s offense. I It was a tough pill to swallow for a player ranked as the No. 1 run-pass quarterback in Texas his.senior y^4T. in high school. B “I felt I was very prepared last year, bin I just didn’t play,” Carter said. “It’s JP Beato III • THE BATTALION Junior Jason Carter signs autographs after Saturday's 26-11 win against Arkansas State. After spending most of 2002 on the bench, the junior quafterback-turned-A-back from Caldwell will now be counted on to provide a spark in Texas A&M's offense. frustrating not to play. I really thought I should have gotten the chance to play all season, but the coaches thought the other two guys (Long and McNeal) should have played more. “Of course, the other guys did a pretty good job,” he said, his voice trail ing off. With each passing week. Carter said, the frustration and desperation to play' continued to build. He even considered transferring. “I thought about it every second of every minute of every hour of every day last year,” he said. “It was hard not to be out there on the field because I knew I could change the game. It got to a point where I was wondering if football was for me, and was it ever going to get any better.” Carter wasn’t the only one who thought he could change the game. His mother. Laquita, also had faith. The two talked on the phone every day, and Laquita said she could tell how strenu ous the situation had become for Jason. Laquita, whose father is a Baptist min ister, used her faith to urge Jason to wait for his chance. “I always tried to use the Bible to tell him about things, and 1 told him to hold on and things would work out for him,” she said. “If you are patient and wait for God to work on his time, then everything would work out.” As the Aggies made their way through their Big 12 schedule, Carter still didn’t see much of the field. Losses to Texas Tech, Nebraska, Oklahoma State and Missouri were even tougher to handle from the sidelines. As her son continued his search for answers, Laquita said she also struggled with the situation. “It was very, very hard on him,” she said. “It was hard on me too because I would be at all the games, and I could look at him and see his face and see him hurting, and that hurt me too. 1 couldn’t really enjoy the games because I could tell how he was feeling. But I knew that since he wasn’t going to play, I had to be there to support him anyway.” Carter took to prayer to try and find an answer for what was happening. “I kept praying about it and asking God to show me something,” he said. And then, finally, a sign. Before A&M’s season finale loss against the University of Texas, A&M coaches told Carter he would probably play early in the game. The first quarter went by and he stayed on the sidelines. Then the second quarter, and then the third. Finally, halfway through the fourth quarter. Carter found himself on the field after Long went down with an injury. After getting sacked on his first play, he scrambled left on fourth down and completed a 15-yard touchdown run with a dramatic head-first leap over a Longhorn defender. A touchdown that meant little to the result of the 50-20 final score meant the world to Carter. “When I finally got in, I thought to myself. This is when I’ll show them what I can do,”’ he said. “The first play, I’m not going to lie - I was nervous. Then the second play, I realized this was the same stuff I’ve done since high school. (UT) blitzed off the edge (on the second play), and I knew exactly what I was going to do. It came naturally. I See Carter on page 2B Grand Opening!! You’ve heard the hype...nowyou know it’s true! Drink • Grub • Chill is now open! 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