Jayru Campbell has one more game to prove himself

Former Detroit Cass Tech star Jayru Campbell will be playing for his football life Saturday afternoon when No. 1 Garden City Community College plays No. 2 Arizona Western College in the El Toro Bowl, the NJCAA national championship game in Yuma.

Campbell will be trying to impress the Division 1 coaches attending the game while playing receiver for Garden City after making the move to that position from quarterback early in the season.

While coaches from Louisville, Kansas and New Mexico have stopped by to watch him play this season, they have yet to pull the trigger on a scholarship offer.

“Everybody’s taking a look at him and I think Saturday will be a big day for him because there’s going to be a lot of schools there,” said Garden City head coach Jeff Sims of Campbell. “I will tell you that it’s a little bit unfortunate that I’ve had several schools that were interested in him, but because of his past they don’t feel like that they can touch him.

“The truth of the matter is those things happened (back in high school) and you would hope you could outgrow your mistakes, but Google makes life very, very hard for some people and it’s hard to redeem yourself these days. I highly recommend Jayru. He’s still a young man who has good days and bad days, but there’s nothing sinister about the young man. He has a great future.”

Prior to his self-inflicted troubles at Cass Tech – an altercation with a school security guard his junior year, then an incident with his girlfriend his senior year – Campbell was committed to Michigan State as a quarterback.

Sims said Campbell is set to graduate in May, which could also be a factor regarding the lack of scholarship offers for Campbell.

“A lot of times recruiting picks up for junior colleges in January for May graduates and coaches are coming now for the December graduates,” said Sims.

Sims believes Campbell will make his way onto a Division 1 roster for next season.

“He’s an NFL talent at wide receiver and somebody just has to give him a chance to prove himself off the field, which he’s done here,” Sims said.