Q&A with Rockdale head coach Jacob Campsey

The Texas Tech coaches landed a commitment from Rockdale all-purpose back Cam'Ron Valdez this evening, and RedRaiderSports reached out to the Tigers' head coach Jacob Campsey to learn more about the latest Red Raider commitment.

JC: "This is my seventh year at Rockdale."

Note: This is Campsey's first season as head coach, he was the defensive coordinator for the previous six seasons.

JC: "You know, as a person he's really business-like. He's very quiet, not a man of many words. He doesn't talk just a whole lot because he doesn't need to, and you don't see that very often. He's extremely humble and so he's just kind of like a business-like worker. He shows up and does what he's supposed to do every day and doesn't need to talk about it. He does everything 115-percent, I think that's the biggest thing about him is there's no difference in game speed and practice speed and that's just kind of how he does things throughout his life."

JC: "Yeah, he played some varsity as a freshman and he was around the team obviously when we won the state championship in 2017, and so he got to see how those guys carried themselves and from that point on he was a varsity football player. To watch his leadership qualities grow and probably come to a head this year, and even as of recently, the leadership on the practice field, on social media, he's really stepping up. Really being a guy that we needed as far as a leader this year and it's been fun to watch his growth."

JC: "I've never seen the ability to have such vision that he has and be able to get to where he needs to be in one step. So from a defensive standpoint it really doesn't matter a lot of times if you're gapped out front, he's gonna see the lanes and he's got the footwork to make an out-of-this-world cut or move and get where he needs to go. Then he's so big and strong, he's not going to be tackled by one person. He's really kind of got it all but I've always said it starts with his vision, he creates so many problems for a defense with how well he sees what's going on in the box. It doesn't matter where a run is designed to go, if there's an opening he's gonna find it."

JC: "Yeah, and you know that kind of speaks to Cam'Ron's character. When he broke the record we were struggling, coming off three losses and things were kinda rough on our team. He really didn't want to make a huge deal out of it, he wanted it to fly under-the-radar but we did celebrate as a team in the locker room. It's a testament to his toughness more than anything. To be able to carry the ball like he does for us going on three years now, he's held up so well and he never turns it down. He's just been a workhorse."

JC: "I haven't dealt with a ton of it because I took over in March, so that was largely coach (Jeff) Miller who dealt with a bunch of that. Cam is just such a guy that doesn't want any attention on him, so it hasn't been anything big honestly. He does have some attention and obviously with COVID there isn't anyone around our practice like there would be any other year, I'm sure it'd be a little different without COVID because there would be people all over the place, but it really hasn't been anything difficult to deal with at all."

JC: "Personally I think there's another senior that they should be having an eye on now in KeSean Raven. He is extremely skilled and talented as a receiver. We have a couple juniors in Kobe Mitchell and Davioun Scott, they're special talents who will continue to emerge in their roles and will eventually end up getting some looks."