In the fall of 2011, his senior season at Everett’s Archbishop Murphy High School, Sam Shober was unsure where he would play college football.
He was unsure if he would even play college football.
Shober was a good high school linebacker, but not quite a blue-chip prospect. Compared to other elite recruits that year, and particularly those at his position, he was thought to be too small and too slow. Some schools made early contact, including the nearby University of Washington, but later on the letters and phone calls pretty much stopped.
As the recruiting season reached its peak, “I didn’t have a Division I scholarship offer anywhere,” Shober said. “I had some interest from a few D-IIs and D-IIIs, but I only had one scholarship offer and that was from a D-II school in Canada. St. Francis, I think.
It was, he said, “definitely disheartening. I even talked to my parents and said, ‘Maybe I won’t play anymore.’”
But in football, some personal attributes cannot be measured by a tape measure or stopwatch. Confidence, for one. Likewise determination, passion and an absolute longing to excel. For Shober, those qualities — and, no less, his love of football — led him to walk on at Stanford University, where he has emerged as a backup linebacker and special teams regular for the 16th-ranked Cardinal.
On Saturday afternoon, Shober will be in Husky Stadium for a pivotal Pacific-12 Conference game between Stanford and Washington.
“I was a Husky fan as a kid and I loved going to Husky games,” said Shober, who lives in Monroe. “So coming back and being in that stadium, it’s going to be surreal.”
In the summer before his senior year at Archbishop Murphy, Shober and his father traveled to recruiting camps at various schools around the country. They attended one at Washington and others on the East Coast, and they went to Stanford for a three-day camp. Unlike the others he attended, the Stanford camp included pads and contact.
“I did my best and I think I played pretty well,” Shober said. And because the workouts were filmed, the Cardinal coaching staff “had tape of me. I think that was the most impressive thing for them and it helped me a ton.”
The Stanford camp “was really when he got on our radar,” said Cardinal defensive coordinator Lance Anderson, who also coaches the team’s outside linebackers. “He made a really nice impression and after that we tried to stay in touch. When we found out that walking on was something he had interest in, we were very excited to get him in our program.”
The 6-foot-3, 227-pound Shober redshirted in the 2012 season and played in just one game a year ago. But this season he is on both the kickoff coverage and kickoff return teams, and he has played linebacker in games against California-Davis and Army.
“He’s worked real hard since he’s been here and that’s what’s helped him earn a role,” Anderson said. “He’s a pretty athletic kid for his size, he runs well and he’s physically strong, and those things benefit him on (the kickoff) teams.
“But I still think he has even more in him. As he gets stronger and learns to use his hands even better and to be even more physical at the point of attack, and with his ability to run, he could earn even more playing time on the defensive side of the ball. So I’m excited to see his progress.”
In the coming years, Shober wants “to get as much out of this program as I can.” He would also like to play professionally, and “if that opportunity arises it would be amazing, though I’m also realistic about my chances,” he said.
But if the NFL dream fails to pan out, Shober has a pretty good backup plan. A human biology major, he wants to attend medical school someday with the goal of becoming a doctor either in family practice or some medical specialty.
Schoolwork, then, is important. And at Stanford, unlike some elite college football programs, there are no classroom shortcuts for athletes.
“I was very well prepared for a college academic experience coming out of high school,” he said. “But in terms of going to (football) practice and then coming back and getting my homework done, that’s something that’s very hard to prepare for. It was incredibly difficult my freshman year.
“As a student-athlete, you have really limited time each day and you have to make each hour count. You always have to be on top of your studies, and it’s very challenging to say the least. You can’t fall behind, especially during the season which is a really challenging time of year.”
But even with Stanford’s intense academic demands, Shober is still overjoyed by how the last few years of his life have unfolded. For a young man who once wondered if he would play college football, he has become an important contributor on one of the nation’s premier teams.
“I’m incredibly happy with what’s happened,” he said. “And I’m definitely grateful for the way that everything has worked out for me.”
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