… Continued from Part 1
The College of San Mateo boasts an impressive list of alumni, including Ryan Boschetti, Bill Walsh, Julian Edelman and perhaps most famously, John Madden. Now, Dru Brown’s name is in that same vein.
As Brown’s one and only season as the starter at Los Gatos High School neared its close, it became clear he wouldn’t get any attention from Division 1 programs. Alternative routes appeared, and Tim Tulloch, who was the Defensive Coordinator for the Bulldogs before being promoted to Head Coach in 2018, wanted Brown on his team.
“His quarterback coach, who I know well, spoke highly of his wiring, mindset, toughness, and grit,” Tulloch said. “When we look at quarterbacks, we don’t just look at how they can spin the ball, we look at how they do when they’re blitzed, what they do on third down, in the two-minute drill. How are they with locker room leadership? How good are they when the bullets are flying?”
From the second Brown stepped foot on the small campus, everything he did had a purpose: to prove people wrong. He won the starting job, but did it in a quiet manner off the field. He commanded respect in the locker room, which Tulloch said wasn’t an easy thing to do.
“When you come into our locker room, it’s mainly black and Polynesian ethnicity, and you’re a white kid from Los Gatos, you have to have some strength to earn respect,” he said. “He came in and he won that locker room over, not by talking, but by working.”
After being unable to earn a walk-on spot at his dad’s alma mater at Washington State, Brown arrived at something of a crossroads: he could either give in and accept the end of his football career, or double down, and prove his worth his own way.
He took the second option, throwing for 1,870 yards and 21 touchdowns in just 11 games, making significant progress throughout the season.
“We weren’t running a huge pass-focused offence at the time, but by the time we got to the end of the season, he was basically calling the plays on the field,” Tulloch said. “We just knew his football IQ was off the charts. I knew his intangibles were uncommon, the kind that you just don’t find. We said ‘Hey, this kid special,’ and he had a great experience with us.”
When all said and done, Brown’s San Mateo career was something more than he could have ever imagined it would have been.
“One of the best things that has happened to me to this day was getting with those people,” Brown said. “I just got really lucky along the way, being with people who encouraged me, spoke life into me and told me I could do what everyone else said I couldn’t.”
Across the country, in the excess of 130 Division 1 FBS schools, only one took interest in Brown, even after a good season with the Bulldogs. Fortunately, the chance given to him by Nick Rolovich and the University of Hawaii was more than enough.
He picked up and moved to Honolulu, going into a new situation that brought a new challenge. Again, he had to win over the room, which he says was easier this time around, thanks to connections he already had, and a coach who believed in him.
Once again, Brown was all business, rarely enjoying the beaches or sunny days on the island, en route to winning the starting job.
“The football definitely took over, as you could imagine,” Brown said. “Not much has changed with how I go about my business. I was in the building a lot of the time and going to class. I spent a lot of time with the coaches there, and I think that was very important for my development, not only from a football standpoint, but also building that confidence.”
In two seasons with the Rainbow Warriors, the Palo Alto, California native chucked 5,273 passing yards and 37 touchdowns, wrapping up his time in Hawaii.
Washington State showed some interest, offering Brown a partial scholarship, which he refused. He held that information close to his chest for years, not telling his family until he had signed a contract in Canada a number of years later, instead holding out for something better.
As a graduate transfer, Brown enrolled at Oklahoma State, where he was immediately eligible to play.
With the Cowboys, Brown backed up Taylor Cornelius in his first season, but took advantage of the NCAA’s new redshirt policy, earning himself one more year, but again, he was relegated to being a backup, this time for redshirt freshman Spencer Sanders.
“I was angry for a while about how things transpired,” Brown admitted. “I felt like maybe some things were said in the recruiting process that weren’t necessarily true, but I think that I should have been smart enough to understand that’s how it’s done.”
touchdowns, and only one interception. Despite the lack of playing, he believes his path took him there for a reason.
“I live here, I love the state, and I love the people here,” Brown said. “I have no regrets. At the time, obviously I was upset, I watched guys play in other places that recruited me, and that kind of ate at me for a while,
but I knew I’d make it right in the end. You just kind of keep grinding away
and keep chipping away.”
The difficult end to his collegiate career left Brown unsure of his football future, but he decided to participate in Oklahoma State’s pro day regardless. He didn’t want to have any regrets.
The expected path was to take advantage of some coaching opportunities he had, likely signalling the end of his playing career, but one phone call changed all of that about a month or two before he was supposed to be on the field for his pro day.
“Coaching was where I thought I was headed until the middle of January or February, that’s when Danny McManus called me and told me that I had been on [Winnipeg’s] negotiation list for quite a while,” Brown said. “I didn’t know that at the time, but I think they claimed me pretty early on. I did my pro day stress-free, and then signed with Winnipeg, probably 45 minutes after my pro day.”
Like that, Brown was a professional.
All the way through his collegiate career, he remembered his roots, whether it was putting his San Mateo sticker on his shoulder pads over his heart in Hawaii, or wearing a Bulldogs shirt which read “underdogs,” his time at San Mateo was always in the forefront, as he remembered the opportunity they afforded his when no one else was listening.
“He always comes home and sees us,” Tulloch said. “We’ll talk concepts and we’ll talk football. Every time he comes in, he talks to the team and pays those values forward. He’s a walking, living, breathing success story that the guys can look up to. He’s never forgotten where he came from and the importance of giving back.”
To be continued…
