- May 6, 2024
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Denali Campbell with the carry. Photos by Michele Meyers
Tashod Troutman.
Amondre Willis and Dimitri Campbell get ready to board the bus headed for camp.
Peyton Schofield waits to board the bus headed for Southeastern University.
Latrae Bass.
Grant Scrabis.
BJ Glenn, Dimitri Campbell, Tashod Troutman, Amondre Willis head back to the Southeastern University campus.
Madox Bovee strong-arms the gatorade.
Coach Pat Brown walks off the Southeastern University's football field following a day of games.
Mike Shropshire Jr.
Dante Jones is all smiles right before the game.
Latrae Bass presses the wide receiver.
Blake Boda daps Rashard Frazer and his teammates as Coach T gives them the game plan.
Blake Boda passes under pressure.
Brothers Dimitri and Eli Campbell celebrate after an excellent Sandcrab play.
Peyton Schofield.
Alex Capua takes a knee as camp wraps up for the week.
Rashard Frazer, Chris Lewis, Tommy Bunch, Alex Killins
Chris Rivera scores a touchdown for the Sandcrabs.
Chris Lewis listens to Seabreeze head coach Pat Brown as he runs through a play.
The Seabreeze Sandcrabs football team has been busy all summer, and not with your everyday “hanging-out-at-the-beach, eating at Larry’s Giant Subs” kind of busy. The players have been investing time in their futures as student-athletes.
Head coach Pat Brown is approaching his third fall season with Seabreeze and continues to focus his energies on team building and good old-fashioned hard work. Summer was not the time to take a break, but to execute a plan that would help his team gel on and off the field while giving them valuable playing time before their first game on Aug. 27. He jumped into action and booked the team into as many college football camps as possible in the months of June and July. Players attended camps at the University of Miami, Florida State University, University of Central Florida, Bethune-Cookman University, Edward Waters University and at the last campus, Southeastern University in Lakeland, July 21-22.
“We have been getting some great workouts and all of our coaches are engaged,” Brown said. “Having seven coaches, including myself, here at a summer camp in the middle of the week shows the dedication that my assistant coaches have in getting my guys better. It starts with the coaching staff. The kids see the staff is working hard so they know that that’s the standard.”
With a bachelor’s degree in economics from Rutgers University and a master’s degree in transformative leadership from Bethune-Cookman University, Brown also knows the
importance of exposing his team of high school students to the possibilities of attending college. He contacted various universities located along the east coast and organized a week-long college tour for his players.
The tour commenced at Charleston Southern University in South Carolina then traveled north with visits to the University of North Carolina at Pembroke and Barton College. Brown also stopped at his alma mater of Rutgers, along with Princeton University while they were in New Jersey. After hitting the northeastern-most campuses on the tour, University of Connecticut and Bryant University of Rhode Island, the Sandcrabs began their trek home, making three more stops, the last one being Savannah State University.
Most of the players expressed interest in one or more of the schools and followed up the tour with additional research. During their stop in South Carolina, Charleston Southern gave punter Mac Chiumento an offer to play and Savannah State University “offered” Jeremy Pirtle and Dimitri Campbell.
The Sandcrabs attended their last camp at Southeastern University where the highs were a consistent 91 degrees both days and hotter on the artificial turf the players had to endure. The team was relieved to play at midnight on the first night.
“We played against Jackson from Jacksonville last night,” assistant coach Mark Lewis said. “We did well. I would rate it as a tie. They’re big, strong, fast, well-coached, a well-disciplined football team. Anytime you can bring a representative effort against a club like that you feel good about it. We went into the dorms feeling really good about the work we put in last night.”
