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'12 PA LB Deaysean Rippy (Pittsburgh Signee)

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College football recruiting -- After a taste of juvenile detention, Deaysean Rippy turned his life around - ESPN

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Daysean Rippy turned his life around after a run-in with the law, and has becoming a fast-rising football prospect.
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Wake-up call brings football into focus

By Josh Moyer
Special to ESPN.com

Deaysean Rippy said he didn't want it to sound dramatic. He didn't want it to sound worse than it was.

But, the rising junior added, he grew up "where the only way out of here is either sports or school, and most people here don't end up going to good colleges.

"They're either on the streets or in jail."

And, in 2007, it seemed as if Sto-Rox High School's (McKees Rocks, Pa.) star linebacker wasn't on pace for a scholarship.

His grandmother, Marian Rowe, was fighting for custody because she said Rippy's mother wasn't involved. Rippy would skip school and hang out with the older boys on the streets. Sometimes, he wouldn't come home until 1 a.m. Other times, he wouldn't go home at all.

"He would see boys selling drugs or exchanging money, and he thought that was glamorous," Rowe said. "A young boy with a fistful of money -- I guess that's what intrigued him."

At some point, Rippy stopped being an observer; he stole a car. He was apprehended and sent to Shuman Juvenile Detention Center and ordered to serve 200 hours of community service.

Rowe resolved to let her grandson spend some time in the center. She ran different scenarios through her head all day: Does he think I don't love him? Should I pick him up; should I wait? What is it like up there?

After 12 days, she decided that was enough. She hoped he'd reverse course after he realized the path on which he was traveling.

"It was the longest 12 days of my life," Rippy said. "It felt like a month. It was a wake-up call. After that, I was like this definitely isn't for me. I was still playing sports at the time, so it really hit me. That was where I needed to be, not on the street."



Said Rowe: "I could tell right away he had changed. ? I had high hopes for him because everyone kept telling me he had talent playing football. I wanted him to pursue an education and sports because I knew that would help keep him out of trouble. I don't want the streets to take my children."



Rippy said he instantly changed his behavior. If jail was anything like juvee, he didn't want to be incarcerated. He stopped spending time with those negative influences; he'd hit the gym, study or play video games instead.



He saw football as a way out -- a way to earn an education. A way to, maybe, one day support his family.



"He hasn't been in trouble since," his grandmother added. "He's doing well in school, he's vice president of his class, and he even got asked to the prom this year by a senior girl. He really did a 360, and I can't tell you how proud I am of him."

Former Sto-Rox coach Jason Ruscitto, who was replaced in December, only saw one side of Rippy since his eighth grade year -- the side of "a high-character kid."

Ruscitto saw potential in Rippy as a middle schooler. Rippy stood 6-foot -- a full 3 inches taller than the varsity coach. He attended every voluntary workout, would be one of the first to arrive and the last to leave.

Sometimes, Ruscitto said, the coaching staff would have to tell Rippy to wrap it up so they could get home to their families.

"Everyone makes mistakes in their life," Ruscitto said. "That's part of learning, and he's learned from that. The way he is now, you'd never know he'd made those mistakes. He grew up and realized what was important."
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These days, Rippy is spending his time with football players he admires, like former Texas QB Colt McCoy.
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Rippy earned a spot on the varsity team as a freshman. In the season opener, when the game was in hand, he went in at defensive end. On his first series, he made a fierce sack and forced a fumble.

He was named the starter in Week 2 and has been ever since. And colleges are taking note of the new Rippy.

Penn State, Pitt and Georgia have been through Sto-Rox already. Panthers defensive line coach Greg Gattuso told Rippy there's a written offer waiting for him Sept. 3, the first day schools are allowed to offer juniors. The Nittany Lions "didn't exactly say an offer," Rippy said, but he feels as if one would eventually come.

"My coach and [defense/cornerbacks] Coach [Tom] Bradley know each other. I talked to Coach Bradley two weeks ago, and he said he'd be here in the end of May," Rippy said. "So you can just tell it's there. It may not be there ASAP, as Pitt's will be, but it's there."

When Penn State quarterbacks coach Jay Paterno was walking the halls last season for Class of 2010 commitment Paul Jones, Jones introduced Paterno to Rippy. According to Rippy, Paterno told him, "You're going to be one of those guys we come back for."

Rowe also briefly spoke with Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt. When a car pulled up by Rowe's home -- Panthers' Class of 2010 commitment Andrew Carswell lives across the street -- Wannstedt stepped out of the car.

"I saw two white men in my neighborhood, and I was like, 'Oh, who are the police after?'" Rowe said with a laugh. "I saw him and I was like, 'Oh my goodness, that's Coach Wannstedt!' I was half-dressed, looking all ratty, but I had to holler at him."

Wannstedt smiled while she talked up her unnamed grandson. After Carswell told Wannstedt that she was Rippy's grandmother, though, the coach briefly stopped over again.

"He said, 'We can't really talk to you. But I saw your grandson in football today, and I thought he was great,'" Rowe remembers.

Nowadays, it's school and football for Rippy. And when he's playing video games, it's still likely a football game: "NCAA 10." He's played "Road to Glory" -- where you create your own player -- about five times already. He started out with Texas, then chose Ohio State, Pitt and Penn State.

And, right now, as he's headed down a road paved with academics and football, there's a good chance he'll be in that very game two years from now.

"I've really turned my life around," Rippy said. "I wasn't that bad, but I was hanging around with the bad crowd, being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"I can't do that anymore. I do solo things myself, and I hang around people who play football or college players who play football. I just want to get better now."
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Recruiting Report: Junior LB at Sto-Rox draws notice
Friday, September 10, 2010
By Mike White, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Sto-Rox football coach Ron Butschle says Deaysean Rippy "isn't close" to reaching his full potential, but college coaches already see Rippy's potential as a Division I linebacker.

Rippy (6 feet 2, 210 pounds) is among a growing list of juniors in the WPIAL that already have scholarship offers from Division I colleges. Hopewell's Rushel Shell and Chartiers Valley's Wayne Capers are two other juniors with major-college offers.

"They can't officially [in writing] offer a scholarship to juniors, but they can verbally," Butschle said. "[Florida defensive coordinator] Teryl Austin was in here. A guy from Ohio State was here. They both all but offered him.

"We were at Maryland and they offered him on the spot. Pitt has offered, Syracuse has offered and a lot of others probably will."

Butschle said Rippy is excellent in blitzes, but he can do a number of things well.

"He's still not physically mature. But when he does mature, watch out. He can run and he's physical," Butschle said.
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Read more: Recruiting Report: Junior LB at Sto-Rox draws notice

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItvJ5r42Vno"]YouTube - Sto Rox's Jr #11 OLB Deaysean Rippy[/ame]
 
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BN $ - Highly Regarded LB Impressed With OSU

9/14

By BK...talks about his first ever visit to OSU this past weekend...has verbal offers from Ohio State, Florida, Pitt, Maryland and Syracuse and interest from PSU, USC and LSU...told Coach Fickell he will be back for another visit.

Love where this one is headed...Shell and Rippy would be a major coup...
 
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Childhood mistake now just a memory for Sto-Rox linebacker
By Chris Harlan, PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, October 3, 2010

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When Deaysean Rippy (right) was detained for being in possession of a stolen vehicle in eighth grade, his grandmother, Marian Rowe (left), told the police to send him to Shuman Juvenile Detention Center to teach him a lesson. Three years later, Rippy says he learned it. "I've changed," said Rippy, who now stars at linebacker for Sto-Rox. "My attitude, my work ethic, my personality (all) changed. As you get older, when you look back on the things you did, it seems foolish."
Christopher Horner | Tribune-Review

Marian Rowe isn't shy when telling the story about the days her grandson spent locked up at the Shuman Juvenile Detention Center.

Three years later, she sees a happy ending.

"It was a hard decision, but I had to teach him a lesson," said Rowe, a longtime McKees Rocks resident who has played a lead role in raising him. "I look at a lot of the men who are standing on the streets, and when they were in high school, they were decent athletes, but then they chose the wrong road.

"I pray he stays grounded."

Her grandson is Deaysean Rippy, a junior at Sto-Rox who has developed into a highly recruited football player. Both maternal grandmother and grandson agree that without the lesson learned those 12 days in 2007, Rippy's future might look much different.

"It was a life-changing moment," said Rippy, a talented linebacker already being coveted by college coaches nationwide. "At that time, I was hanging around a bad crowd. After I went to Shuman, I knew this lifestyle wasn't for me.

"That was my first and last time."
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Top linebacker prospect

Rippy had no choice but to mature quickly.

"If people only knew what Deaysean has gone through, and a number of other kids on the team have gone through," said Sto-Rox coach Ron Butschle, whose McKees Rocks experience stretches back a couple of decades. "It's not so easy for them. One thing football provides for Deaysean is an outlet where, for three or four hours a day, the outside world doesn't exist."

On the football field, Rippy, a 6-foot-2, 215-pound linebacker, has become a star.

After last season, when Rippy had 77 tackles and seven sacks, Rippy was named one of the nation's best sophomores by Maxpreps.com.

"He's got as much talent as anybody I've coached at the linebacker spot," said Butschle, who believes Rippy could become one of the country's best linebackers during the rest of this season and next. "He's very, very fast. He's very athletic. I think he's going to grow into a 225-pound linebacker who has all the skills to play inside or outside."

Rippy exceled at the February Nike Camp in Pittsburgh. There, he ran the shuttle in 4.5 seconds and the 40-yard dash in 4.79, though he has bettered that mark elsewhere. In the classroom, he's carrying a 3.2 grade-point average.

National recruiting expert Tom Lemming of CBS College Sports said Rippy should be a top 100 recruit as a senior and has considered Rippy for his upcoming All-American team of juniors.

"He'll be a national name by next year," Lemming said.
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Although college football programs cannot give written scholarship offers to juniors, Rippy expects them from Pitt, Ohio State, Florida and many others when the time comes. Football could provide Rippy a path to college that sometimes is rare in McKees Rocks, where only 8 percent have bachelor's degrees.

When his family was on vacation, he and his grandmother visited the University of Florida's campus in Gainesville and spoke with coaches.

"It was the experience of a lifetime," Rowe said. "Not to take anything away from the other schools, but I think that would be a good place for him."
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http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/s_702515.html
 
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BN$ - Top LB Will Visit Ohio State This Weekend

11/12

By BK...was at the Miami game and will be in town for the PSU game this weekend...has offers from the likes of Michigan, Virginia, Ohio State, Pitt, Florida, Maryland, Syracuse and others.

This kid is the top LB on my board for 2012...mostly because of his on-field talent but also because of how he has gotten himself on track to be an outstanding student-athlete and citizen...
 
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Maybe the fact our new Governor is from McKee's Rocks will carry some sway with this fine young player. Come to Ohio so you can succeed one day in politics!


(Maybe that's not such a good selling point after all ...)
 
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Scout $ - Rippy Updates His Status

11/16

By Lichtenfels...talks about his most recent offer, which is from Michigan and says he is close with Ryan Mundy...talks about enjoying his visit to Columbus this past weekend...has been to two games at Pitt...also talks about a trip he made to Florida back in June...has also been to Syracuse and Maryland...hasn't heard from PSU...wide open but likes Pitt, OSU and Florida.

BN $ - OSU-PSU: Rippy Reacts

11/16

By BK...talks about how crazy the atmosphere was at The Shoe...talks about the coaches he talked to and knowing some of the guys on the team from Pennsylvania...talks about how he sees himself at the next level and will be back for the Michigan game.
 
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ScarletVader;1817737; said:
Is there a chance he pulls the trigger? He knows numbers are tight next year and Ohio is loaded with DE/LB types next year??

Two trips to OSU in 3 weeks says a ton.
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He's more of a LB/S than LB/DE...FWIW.
 
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I'm starting to think Rippy may just end up a Buckeye. I don't think PSU is a factor, and Pitt is the only I feel is a threat. Pitt is struggling, their coach could be on the hot seat. It says alot that he is coming again this weekend for what I think will be his 3rd game this year.
 
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