In March, Kentucky's state senate unanimously passed a bill that would allow high school athletes in the class of 2021 to return for a fifth year of competition.
The reaction afterward, from what I saw, was split between two camps. Many applauded the Kentucky legislature for having their hearts in the right place in doing the best they could to rewind the clock amid what was an all-time terrible year to be a high school senior. Others saw the news and thought, "Pfft, what kind of Wooderson would want to stay in high school an extra year? Get me out of there ASAP!" Plenty of people found themselves in both camps simultaneously.
One 2021 senior has stepped forward and said he'll take advantage of this one-time-only rule.
Cameron Hergott announced this week he will reclassify to 2022, and it's clear to see why he wants to take advantage of SB128.
Hergott is the reigning Mr. Football in the state and led Beechwood to the Class 2A state championship in December. He accounted for 41 touchdowns with 2,467 passing yards and 1,078 rushing yards. Sounds like the credentials of a college football quarterback, right? Wrong.
Listed at just 6-feet tall and without the ability to camp last summer, Hergott is currently committed to Akron... as a walk-on.
“A big part of it is going to their camps. When coaches see you in person, that’s usually when offers start to come through. I didn’t get that opportunity this year. I worked my butt off the whole offseason and got a whole lot stronger, got a whole bigger, got a whole better and I didn’t get to show coaches that at their camps," Hergott told Fox-19 in Kentucky.
It's become somewhat commonplace for parents to delay their son's entrance into high school either by delaying their entrance to kindergarten or by repeating eighth grade. And it's always been accepted for college students to take more than the officially prescribed four years to earn their degree. But voluntarily repeating a year of high school is unheard of, until now.
Given his circumstances, Hergott's decision to take a Super Senior year, awkward as it may be, makes total sense for himself and is obviously a boon for Beechwood . Unless you're the poor kid who happens to be behind him on the depth chart.