Hopeful Red Raiders prepare for draft, next step

By ANDREW FALLON SportS reporter

Almost 60 years ago, former Red Raider Dave Parks was selected No. 1 overall in the 1964 NFL draft, becoming one of only three wide receivers selected first overall in the draft.

As the 2023 NFL Draft nears, Tech athletes will have their chance of being selected to pursue their passion at the professional level.

One of the nation’s top draft prospects and Tech’s most highly-touted prospect going into the draft, edge rusher Tyree Wilson has the chance to be the highest Red Raider draft pick since the NFL - AFL merger in 1970.

Wilson, who did not participate in the pro day as he recovers from a foot injury, said returning to Lubbock for his senior season was the best option for his career.

“Me and coach McGuire both knew that there was another level I can take,” Wilson said March 29 at Texas Tech Pro Day.

“It was the best decision for me to come back and it’s paid off being able to be a player under him and help develop me and take my game to another level.”

Mock drafts from CBS Sports, SB Nation and NFL staff writers have Wilson projected to go inside the top 10 of the first round with the majority of major media outlets having him as the sixth or seventh overall pick.

While Wilson’s ticket to the pros is seemingly already punched, the rest of the Red Raider draft hopefuls are fighting for an opportunity to be signed by an NFL team.

Kicker Trey Wolff, who nailed a 60-yard field goal during Tech’s pro day, is looking ahead at his options other than the draft.

“I’ll be looking for local tryouts,” Wolff said. “I’ve been talking to some teams so hopefully I’ll be picked up.”

McGuire said the Tech football support team helps players prepare for the professional level.

“So we talked about it all the time, you got to be able to take notes in meetings, ask the coaches to check the players’ notes to make sure they’re writing down and understanding. I think these guys have heard it and really are prepared to try to take that next step,” McGuire said.

While the coaching staff plays its role in propelling the athletes to success, the players themselves have found self-motivation to get them into the next phase of their careers.

Tech super-senior defensive back Adrian Frye, a Red Raider since 2017, said easing his family’s financial worries motivate him to go pro.

“(My family) is kind of who I do it for first and foremost, just because it’s been what we’ve talked about long nights and Saturday mornings and things like that,” Frye said.

“Next is the women in my family,” Frye said. “All of my sisters, my mom, my grandmother and my great grandmother, because I’ve seen them struggle since I was a kid and I just want to pretty much get my people out of a worrying state. No more stressing about bills and things like that and just showing them that we don’t have to live the same way we’ve always lived.”

The draft begins on April 27 and will go through April 29. Live coverage can be found on ESPN, ABC and NFL Network.

... what happens to me.”

And that she did. Taking this experience, Kerrick Davis felt better equipped to deal with the inevitable adversities she would face.

“Two years later, I get told by a teacher in my high school that I have no business being in his honors physical science class because, ‘Girls shouldn’t be in there,’” Kerrick Davis said. “And so I took him on, and proved to him that I should be there.”

Proving her worth and proving she would not be beaten became a staple of Kerrick Davis’ personality.

Kerrick Davis began her college education at the University of Texas at El Paso, where she played basketball with the hopes of going professional. Then, dislocating her knee at the beginning of her freshman season, both her basketball career and her time at UTEP were finished.

Despite where she first went to college and the other schools she considered, there was one university Kerrick Davis felt drawn to. Kerrick Davis’ father attended Tech from 1955 to 1958, and this part of her family history played a major role in her final academic decision.

However, this change was not easy. Kerrick Davis lacked the money to attend Tech and sought the help of Dr. Walter Borst, the then head of the physics department.

“That man, in the two hours that I was (touring), found me three scholarships and two part-time jobs, sum total of which would cover everything I needed to go to school and live there my junior year,” Kerrick Davis said. “It was because of him that the doors to Texas Tech opened for me.”

With the help of Dr. Borst, Kerrick Davis was able to enroll, only to lose one scholarship as her GPA fell to 2.7 within her first years at Tech. Taking on a third part-time job to pay her tuition, Kerrick Davis knew she had to work harder to move past the situation she had put herself in.

In the year she planned to graduate, the federal government enacted a hiring freeze.

In response, Kerrick Davis called NASA weekly for four months in pursuit of her dream job until the day they offered her a position. Kerrick Davis was close to finally reaching her goal: becoming an astronaut and having the opportunity to go into space. But, on the heels of her hard work, Kerrick Davis received life-changing news.

“I wanted to be an astronaut and found out I had kidney stones, which was a lifetime disqualification from consideration,” Kerrick Davis said. Devastated and thrown off track, Kerrick Davis was lost, but not broken.

“There’s all these things that happen where you’re like, ‘Really? Really. One more thing?’ Every time it happens, it feels like the worst thing ever. I remind myself that it’s not, that I’ve already survived the worst thing ever,” Kerrick Davis said. “As bad as this makes me feel, I know I’m gonna be okay. I figure out, ‘How do I look at this problem differently,’ to enable the logic part of my brain to overcome the emotional part and continue to move forward.”

It takes a certain kind of strength and faith to overcome all that Ginger Kerrick Davis has. But it is not without effort and trust that she has been able to move forward.

“I have a very strong connection with God, and I believe that whatever thing that I have to go through (is) just part of a larger plan that sometimes I’m allowed to understand, and sometimes I’m not. But I don’t question it,” Kerrick David said. “I just know that whatever hap- pened was probably supposed to happen, so I just gotta figure out a way to get through.”

Kerrick Davis’ ability to overcome the obstacles thrown at her comes from her faith in God and determination to not be dragged down by the emotions and hardships that could have easily overpowered her.

“A lot of people will fall into what I call a pit of despair … I don’t choose to live that way; it’s a choice to do that, to allow your brain to take that trip, and I just don’t see any value in it. I choose not to take that path and choose positivity,” Kerrick Davis said.

Ginger Kerrick Davis can be seen as a role model for women and anyone struggling to achieve their goals. Her story and sheer perseverance created a personality anyone would be willing to follow.

“I know I’ve made a lot of contributions to human spaceflight, the success of all these NASA missions; But the thing that really drives me, that really makes me happy, is when I know I have made a difference in a young person’s life,” Kerrick Davis said.

Kerrick Davis’ ability to serve as a precedent for others and use the positions she has earned to inspire, will mark her in history as a legend and a role model, for so much more than just her career.

“If a talk that I give, or the service that I provide as a Regent, can help a single student think differently about themselves, or think differently about a problem, or push a little harder because they heard about some of my stories and reach their own definition of success, that’s the difference that I really want to make in the world, and that’s what brings me joy,” Kerrick Davis said. “I don’t remember a whole lot about my thesis, I don’t remember a whole lot about some of these missions, but I do remember the people; and that’s why I do what I do.”