From Herder to Cowboy

This story took second place for Sports News Writing during the 2008 Wyoming Press Association awards.

From Herder to Cowboy

By BRENDAN BURNETT-KURIE

His dream just came true.

“If you had told me a year ago that I would be signing a national letter of intent, I would have called you a liar,” Glenrock senior Jim Downs said just moments before signing on to play football at the University of Wyoming Feb. 6 at Glenrock High School. “Ever since I was a little kid I wanted to be a Cowboy. I grew up watching the Cowboys and they’ve been my heros ever since. From Jerry Hill all the way to Casey Bramlett and Chase Johnson. It’s definitely where I wanted to be.”

Flanked by his mother, Sally, and, father Brooke, Downs put his John Hancock on what may be the most important piece of paper he’s ever seen: His national letter of intent to play offensive tackle at the University of Wyoming. Making it even more special is the fact that he’s the only Wyoming native in this year’s Cowboy recruiting class.

“It makes me feel real special,” Downs said. “Everyone’s been calling me the True Cowboys. I’m the only one in this recruiting class representing Wyoming and it’s a great feeling.”

The Pokes first expressed interest in the 6’7” 280 lb. offensive tackle with an invitation to their Junior Day last spring. Downs was one of two Wyoming athletes invited to the event, and it was his first opportunity to meet his future coaches.

“I got a letter inviting me to Junior Day at the University of Wyoming, and that’s when this thing really got rolling,” Downs said. “I went down and gave them a tape, and after that they sent me a letter saying ‘We like what we see on your tape, we’ll be keeping in touch with you.’”

With two years starting on the offensive line, and one year as a starter for the defense, Downs headed down for a summer camp at the university. After a scrimmage one day he was approached by head coach Joe Glenn.

“I thought, I don’t compare to these kids and I wasn’t expecting anything,” Downs said. One day I was coming out of a scrimmage and getting a drink of water and coach Glenn pulled me aside and said, ‘If you choose to be a Cowboy, we have a full ride waiting for you.’”

It’s that modesty, combined with an incredible drive to succeed that has allowed Downs to reach his lifetime goal of playing Division I football.

“He’s the one who set his goal at Division I football,” Glenrock head coach Ray Kumpula said. “We kind of went along with him and pushed him a little bit, but he was the one who said ‘I can do this.’ He just went around getting it done.”

The word dream was used by almost everyone surrounding the beaming senior.

“He called me upon the phone and said, ‘What this means is I’m going to be a Wyoming Cowboy,’ and he said it the way only Jim could say it,” Kumpula said. “You knew he just made his dream.”

“Like he said, it’s a dream come true,” his dad, Brooke Downs, said. “I didn’t expect that it would come to him, but he’s worked hard both academically and in the weight room to achieve this. He’s got a great opportunity ahead of him.”

Moments after his life-changing chat with a Wyoming legend, Downs scrambled to find his cell phone and call his parents.

“It was exciting,” Downs said. “It was hard to describe. I ran right home and called my mom. Neither my mom or dad answered so I called my grandma and she couldn’t believe it. I finally got a hold of my mom and dad and they thought I was pulling a joke on them.”

But it wasn’t a joke. Kumpula remembers sitting at his cabin when he got a phone call.

“I was vacationing at my cabin and coach (Donnie) Stewart called me and said ‘Jim got offered.’ I said ‘Offered what?’ He said ‘Wyoming offered him a scholarship.’ I said ‘Well that’s tremendous’,” he said.

In December, coach Glenn traveled to Glenrock to watch a boys basketball practice and then spent about an hour with the Downs family in their living room.

“I remember it was a Monday night because there was a Monday Night Football game on, the Packers,” Brooke said. When asked if it was the game Brett Favre ended in overtime with an 80-yard pass to Donald Driver he responded, “I don’t remember because we weren’t watching.”

“That was a lot of fun,” the younger Downs said. “Before he left, coach Glenn sat down at our piano and played ‘Ragtime Cowboy Joe’ on our piano and we all sang along to it. It was a fun experience.”

As a GHS senior, after having committed to being a Cowboy for the next four years, Downs led an offensive line that led the Herders to the state championship game, setting Glenrock single season records for rushing yards, total yards and points. Kumpula explained, however, that it wasn’t just Downs’ size that helped him become such a great member of two teams that made it to the state championship.

“We got pretty comfortable running behind him,” he said, noting the Herders ran behind Downs on 80-90 percent of their plays. “The greatest thing Jim brings is his personality. When he came back from Wyoming, he realized that a Division I scholarship meant he had to be a leader. The kids saw that and elected him captain of the team. It got to the point where he was instructing the younger kids on the field.”

In Kumpula’s 27 years as a coach, he has had two players sign national letters of intent: Downs and Jeston Karns, a tight end who committed to Wyoming in 2002. The coach went on to explain why Downs was a D-I prospect.

“First of all, he fits the filters of a Division I athlete: the height, the weight, the size,” Kumpula said. “As Joe Glenn says you can’t coach that part of the game. Secondly, his willingness to work to get to that point.”

Downs was ranked by the website footballgameplan.com as the No. 1 prospect in the state of Wyoming, ahead of Jackson’s Blaine Woodfin.

In its press release announcing the signing of Downs, the University of Wyoming described him as “the top recruit at any position in the state of Wyoming.”

Despite being such a prized commodity to college football programs, Downs can sometimes sound like the 18-year-old kid he actually is.

“Today is a very exciting day,” Downs said. “I had trouble sleeping last night because I knew everything was going to be official today.”

This summer, Downs will enroll in the second summer session at UW and take a light load of classes. He is prepared for the differences between the high school game and the college version.

“It’s faster and a lot bigger,” he said. “I’ve only gone up against kids my size a couple times and now I’ll be going up against kids bigger than me. It will definitely take a lot of work and it’ll be interesting.”