Impact Back
July 03, 2003 05:45 PM | General
July 3, 2003
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Kevin “Kay-Jay” Harris was sitting in the football office at Garden City Community College when he noticed a West Virginia press guide on the shelf.
He grabbed the book and opened it right to the page where Coach Calvin Magee’s biography was.
Talk about serendipity.
Calvin Magee and Kay-Jay Harris have known each other since Kay-Jay was in the seventh grade. Magee watched with awe as the much-bigger Harris ran through and around the other kids playing on the field that day.
“He actually thought I was ready to go to high school but I was still only in the seventh grade,” said Harris.
A relationship that blossomed between the two was rekindled when Harris picked up the telephone and called his old friend, now living in Morgantown, W.Va., in the spring of 2002.
“Hello,” answered Magee.
“You know who this is?” asked Harris.
“No.”
“Well I’m ready to come back to school and I think you’d be dying to have me,” Harris teased.
“Who is this?”
“It’s Kay-Jay Harris.”
Magee nearly fell out of his chair. He thought Harris was still playing professional baseball in the Texas Rangers organization.
Harris explained that professional baseball didn’t work out and he decided to give college football a try. Kay-Jay knew next to nothing about West Virginia University but at that very moment he decided he wanted to play football for the Mountaineers.
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| Kay-Jay Harris works out at the Puskar Center. (All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks) |
Even when Kay-Jay Harris was little he was always big. He recalls having to endure the embarrassment of being asked to strip down to his underwear to make weight to play pee-wee football.
“The scales were about to touch and I’m blowing out air and doing everything I can to make weight,” he said.
Whenever his mother signed him up for pee-wee football she always made sure she had his birth certificate handy. No one could believe a kid that young could be that big and that good.
The first year Harris played little league football he was relegated to nose tackle even though he was faster than all of the other kids. The next year he decided to switch leagues so he could play running back. The very first time he ran the ball he scored on a long touchdown run.
Harris continued to impress at Tampa Bay Tech High where he found success in every sport he tried. He was an all-county running back, won the state long jump title though he rarely practiced and was good enough in baseball to be drafted in the 10th round by the Rangers despite playing the sport just one season in high school.
He made an oral commitment to Miami and planned to play for the Hurricanes along with Tampa area standout Kenny Kelly when the Rangers made an offer Harris just couldn’t turn down.
Harris wound up signing with Texas for $125,000, with the provision that if he didn’t play college football, the organization would also pick up his college education.
“The deal was if I played baseball full-time they would give me more money,” said Harris. “If I did both I’d get less money, so of course I was going to play baseball. I was 18 years old and that was a lot of money being thrown in my face.”
He began in the Gulf Coast League in 1997 and advanced to as high as the South Atlantic League in 1998. A year later, Harris was sent down to the Appalachian League where he batted .224 with 25 stolen bases. He played centerfield and hit leadoff at Pulaski, Va.
“I was starting to come along and I was second in the league in stolen bases behind Rafael Furcal,” said Harris.
But Harris never quite hit well enough to warrant higher advancement.
“When I had to face guys like C.C. Sabathia and guys throwing 96 I’d prefer to see the breaking ball,” said Harris. “It’s kind of weird because everyone else preferred to see the fastball.”
During long bus rides through the mountains of southern West Virginia and southwestern Virginia, Harris began having second thoughts about a baseball career.
“One day I was just sick and tired of it,” he said. “It wasn’t fun at all.”
So Harris went back home and tracked down his old high school football coach John Kolbert. Because it was mid-summer and Harris hadn’t taken the ACT, his only alternative was to go to junior college for two years before signing with a four-year school. Kolbert put together a highlight tape and sent 15 of them out to junior colleges.
“We sent the tapes out on Monday and every single school called back before Friday,” Harris said.
What they saw was a muscular, 6-foot-2, 240-pound running back with sprinter speed. It was a rare combination.
Kay-Jay made up his mind to go to Dodge City Community College in Kansas and just before he dropped his letter in the mailbox he had a change of heart.
“I grabbed a tape of a Dodge City game and realized that I really didn’t want to go there,” said Harris.
Instead, he picked rival Garden City Community College, which was about 50 miles from Dodge City. Garden City was the same school that produced Corey Dillon and Harris thought he had a better chance of making a name for himself there.
When Harris arrived at Garden City he knew he had to shake off the rust of not playing football for the past four years.
“The first day we started in pads I banged my shoulder,” he said. “I didn’t tell them and that kind of made me run smarter. Three days later we had our first scrimmage and I banged up my other shoulder. So now I’m playing with two bad shoulders.”
Despite having two sore shoulders, Harris took his very first carry 70 yards for a touchdown. And despite having a couple of established backs, there was no question Harris was going to be Garden City’s starting running back.
Harris rushed for almost 1,300 yards and 11 touchdowns his freshman season to earn second team all-conference honors. Soon the entire Big 12 Conference and most of the Midwest began calling him.
But by then Kay-Jay found out about Calvin Magee and was making plans to come to West Virginia.
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| Kay-Jay Harris spent four years in the Texas Rangers organization before returning to football two years ago. (WVU Sports Communications photo) |
Nagging injuries limited Harris to just 808 yards and eight touchdowns his sophomore season, but he still managed to average 6.6 yards per carry.
“I always felt like I had to take every carry 80 yards,” he said. “That’s just the way I play.”
Once Harris, now 24, began studying West Virginia’s offense a little more closely he came to appreciate his value in it.
“There have always been seven or eight guys in the box playing against me,” he said. “You can’t do that in the spread. You’ve got one guy to beat and it’s a cutback. The running back always has an advantage running toward someone. You know what you’re going to do but they have to guess.”
Now that Harris has all of his junior college academic work completed, the West Virginia coaching staff is making big plans to use Harris in this year’s offense. The Mountaineers already have established backs in Quincy Wilson and Hikee Johnson, and up-and-coming runners Jason Colson, Erick Phillips and Bryan Wright to go along with Harris. This gives West Virginia a very formidable group of runners.
“You’ve got everything you need in six different guys,” said Harris.
Kay-Jay hinted that Coach Rich Rodriguez may have some special formations to take advantage of his size and speed. Some of those formations may include both Harris and Wilson.
One idea is to use Harris out of the backfield where he can be isolated one-on-one against smaller defensive backs. Making a pass last year to 5-foot-8 Avon Cobourne is much different than throwing the ball to 6-foot-2 Kay-Jay Harris this season.
“Rasheed doesn’t have to be perfect with his passes,” said Harris. “All he has to do is get it over the linebacker and I can go up and get it.”
Although West Virginia has six quality backs, Harris believes there is enough room for everyone to shine.
“I’m not coming in to move others out of the way,” he said. “There’s enough room in this offense for everyone. I just want to come in and do my part.”
Doing his part also includes playing special teams. “I want to play on the kickoff and kickoff return teams,” he said. “I actually have more fun when I’m not carrying the ball. That’s the time to pay back the guys who hit me.”
It’s safe to assume Kay-Jay Harris will have plenty of opportunities to carry the football this season. And don’t be surprised if he’s standing out on the goal line on the kickoff return team for the season opener on Aug. 30. Remember, the first time he touched the football in junior college he took it the distance for a touchdown.
Now wouldn’t that be nice?
