Drive, discipline and family molded Everett Wormley's success

Burlington Township junior wide receiver Everett Wormley had an early start on his way to becoming a division 1 (FBS) football player. And that start happened in a rather unusual way.

As a young boy growing up in Southern New Jersey, Wormley did not immediately take to the game of football.

“I was in the second grade and my parents kept on asking me if I wanted to play football. For some reason, I didn’t really want to play,” Wormley said. “But then I went to my cousin’s football banquet and they had all these trophies there. They all looked good. I thought, ‘maybe I do want to play football.’”

That was enough to convince a young Wormley to join a pee-wee football program in Burlington Township, N.J.

A year later, he already had his own trophy.

“We finished second in the league and went like 9-1, but we lost in the championship,” Wormley said.

That would be the first of many trophies for Wormely, who was always a wide receiver by trade.

“I actually played receiver pretty much my whole career, a little bit of running back and defensive end," he said. "They usually put the best athletes at defensive end when you are younger so they can just go after the quarterback.”

On his way to earning trophies, accolades and college football scholarships, Wormley had some help close to home.

“My dad pushed me very hard when I was younger. There were times we butted heads, but him staying on me really paid off,” Wormley said. “I used to tell my dad all the time what I wanted to do and he knew what it took to get there.”

Wormley mentioned how his father, William Wormley, was able to elevate his game as both a youth football coach and father.

“He would get on me to do my push-ups before bed. As soon as the summer hit, my dad would be out there throwing to me while I was running routes. We did a lot of footwork stuff. There were a lot of things the normal sixth or seventh grader wouldn’t be doing. We put in a lot of extra time. I was not one of those kids who just went out there and played in the game and that was it.”

That kind of work ethic instilled quite a bit of discipline in Wormley by the time he reached high school.

“A lot of my coaches rave about how disciplined I am and the character I have. That comes from my dad,” Wormley said. “My dad was hard on me. I may go out in a game and have 10 catches for 200 yards and have one drop. The first thing he would say to me is 'why did you drop that ball?’ But I realized he was just trying to get the best out of me. Perfection is not attainable, but you always want to chase it. He instilled that in me.”

Wormley started to assert himself as a player and when it was time to choose a high school, some South Jersey parochial schools came calling.

“There was definitely some thought to going to one of those schools,” Wormely said. “Schools like Camden Catholic, Paul VI and The Hun School had a lot of interest in me coming out of eighth grade. A lot of people told me not to go to Burlington Township. There have been a lot of talented athletes come through there, but for some reason none of them have gone on to play division 1 football. But I believed if you have the talent and drive to go to the next level, then you will.”

Wormley enrolled in Burlington Township and worked his way into the rotation by the end of his freshman year. He also caught the attention of some colleges as Rutgers and Temple were the first two programs to start recruiting him.

“The recruiting process was new to my dad too,” Wormley said. “But I was lucky to have some coaches help guide me through the recruiting process.”

Among those coaches was Burlington Township head coach Tom Maderia and Next Level Greats 7-on-7 coach Marcus Hammond.

“My head coach, Coach Maderia, coached at West Virginia and he was an assistant at Navy before he started coaching high school football,” Wormley said. “So he knew the ins and outs of the recruiting process and what coaches look for in a division 1 athlete. And Coach Marcus really guided me through the recruiting process. He told me how to present myself to coaches, how to present myself on social media and a lot of other things. They both really helped me.”

As a result, Womrley wound up with a host of scholarship offers and decided on Rutgers last week, bringing an end to his recruitment and the fulfillment of a boyhood dream.

“My dad wanted me to stay close to home. So when I finally told them Rutgers was where I really wanted to be, my whole family was excited,” Wormley said. “It was just a great feeling. I have dreamed about this since I was a kid and now it is a reality.”

And Wormley had made all that happen while playing for his local high school, very close to home.

“I had a drive within me, especially since people did not come out of Burlington and become a division 1 player. I wanted to prove people wrong,” Wormley said. “I wanted to show that you can stay at Burlington Township and still get offers and still go to a division 1 school. You don’t have to go to a Camden Catholic or a Paul VI. That really drove me to do what I had to do.”

Wormley also intends to take the same approach to his college career.

“I am definitely going to bring that mentality to Rutgers. A lot of people think that if you want to succeed in the Big Ten, you have to go to Ohio State or Michigan or Michigan State. We are going to prove that wrong on our quest at Rutgers. [Head] Coach [Chris] Ash has us believing that. We are going to shock the Big Ten and become a powerhouse just like those other schools.”