Alex Butt vividly remembers his greatest football moment.
Wearing the crimson and white of Alabama, Butt ran onto the field at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa and played in front of around 50,000 fans in the Tide’s spring game in 2005.
The lifelong Alabama fan was living his dream, as he grew up in his Hereford home idolizing Tide players back Shaun Alexander and Bobby Humphrey.
Butt will never forget the cheers, the hits and the smell of the grass that spring afternoon. But he still recalls how he felt two weeks later, when one of Alabama’s strength coaches called to tell him he was going to be the team’s final cut.
The Tide auditioned 30 walk-ons — non-scholarship players — and kept just two.
“I called up my parents and said ‘Dad, I don’t want to play football anymore.’ I lost the state championship [with Hereford] my senior year, I couldn’t make Alabama and I am done with it,” Butt said. “I don’t know what speech he gave me to get back in, but I called [Hereford football coach Steve] Turnbaugh a few days later and he got on the phone with [Towson] coach [Rich] Bader and one thing led to another and they brought me into camp and here I am at Towson.”
This fall, Butt will be counted on to bolster a defense that ranked 43rd in the 119-team Football Championship Subdivision last year, allowing an average of 22 points and 353 yards per game last season.
Butt, who is expected to make his first start in Towson’s season opener against Navy on Saturday afternoon at 3:30 at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium, will be counted on to replace All-American Brian Bradford.
Bradford, who has been trying out for several NFL teams, was second in the nation with 149 tackles last season. Butt made six tackles last season and has 20 for his career.
“We need to step up and can’t miss a beat,” Butt said. “It can’t be ‘We miss Bradford,’ it has to be, ‘We are happy we have Alex.’”
Make that an Alex who no longer resembles the kid who arrived on campus three seasons ago. The 6-foot-2, 218-pounder has stopped shaving, as his thick bushy beard make him look like a lumberjack. And he doesn’t expect to change his appearance any time soon.
“I started growing it towards the end of the summer and said ‘hey, I am just going to keep it through camp,’” he said. “Now I am going to keep it through Navy. But if we beat Navy, and have an undefeated season, I might soon look like a member of a ZZ Top cover band.”
Towson coach Gordy Combs said it’s imperative Butt makes a seamless transition of the Tigers are going to contend for their first FCS playoff berth after concluding a 3-8 season with five straight losses.
“He has been an excellent special teams player for us the past two years,” Combs said. “He really stepped up and has done a terrific job in our offseason program and played well in the spring and continues to do so in fall practice.”
TOWSON SCHEDULE
- Saturday: at Navy, 3:30 p.m.
- Sept. 6: vs. Morgan State, 6 p.m.
- Sept. 13: at Richmond, 3 p.m.*
- Sept. 20: at Coastal Carolina, 7 p.m.
- Sept. 27: vs. Columbia, 3 p.m.
- Oct. 4: vs. Northeastern, noon*
- Oct. 11: vs. Rhode Island, 3 p.m.*
- Oct. 25: at New Hampshire, noon*
- Nov. 1: vs William & Mary, noon*
- Nov. 8: at Delaware, noon*
- Nov. 15: at Villonava, 1 p.m.*
- Nov. 22: vs. James Madison, 1 p.m.*
SEASON HINGES ON: Sept. 20 at Coastal Carolina. The Tigers likely will be underdogs in every game before they head down to Conway, S.C., to face the Chanticleers. Coastal Carolina returns 16 starters from a team that finished 5-6 last season, but lost its key offensive players and the Tigers could get a huge confidence boost with a close win on the road.
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