ONE MORE REP! Brother’s Miraculous Recovery From Brain Tumor Was Inspiration Behind Receiver’s No. 11 Jersey and Success

A NEW BEGINNING

“I said, ‘Why don’t you come down here and we’ll see what you got,’” Stricklin recalls of his first conversation with the now 5’10, 180-pound receiver who has played in 27 games at UMHB since 2022.

Stricklin put him on offense, and he made some great plays, so he offered him a spot on the team. “Let’s go talk to your parents,” Stricklin said.

“Well if it costs money, I can’t do it,” the fourth-grader responded.

“Well, don’t worry about that. Let’s just go talk to them,” Stricklin replied.

The short drive to his home was one that would change the lives of Stricklin, Jerry, and Stricklin’s son, Brock, who quickly became one of Jerry’s closest friends, on and off the field.

“We got in the truck and drove over to where he was living, and the conditions weren’t ideal,” Stricklin said. “So Jerry ended up going home with us that night, and he’s been with us every day since, for the last 12 years.”

Jerry has not wanted to leave. In fact, the proximity to his family in Academy played a significant role in his decision to continue his collegiate career with the Cru.

“UMHB was close to home,” Jerry said of his college decision, “and it felt like home.”

He has been a Crusader for four years now, and a reliable target downfield for UMHB’s quarterbacks over the last three seasons. His varsity debut, on a night in which The Cru’s 2021 Stagg Bowl team was honored, saw Jerry make four catches for 77 yards and a touchdown on Sept. 3, 2022, against Muhlenberg.

“It’s no surprise the kind of game he had,” Harmon said of Jerry after the win. “We know who he is. And that’s why he’s on varsity. To be in our top seven at wide receiver is really saying something.”

Jerry backed that up in the performances that followed. He finished his sophomore year with 13 receptions for 148 yards and in each of the last two seasons, has recorded over 250 receiving yards. During the 2024 regular season, he led UMHB’s balanced receiving corps with 19 catches for 363 yards, including a 102-yard performance on Senior Day against Howard Payne.

Considering the fact that Jerry has only been a full-time receiver since the spring of 2022 and the significance of his quick start—and subsequent success in the years that have followed—makes his success that much more notable. He came to UMHB as a quarterback, but even through his success under center for the junior varsity squad in 2021, the coaching staff already saw his potential as a pass-catcher. So when the coaches spoke with him on the first day of spring workouts about a position switch, Jerry was all ears.

“Playing receiver on the scout team [came about because] we had a lot of quarterbacks,” Jerry said. “I was like, ‘I’ll go help them somewhere else.’ I ran full speed, and it kind of came naturally to me.”

He also noted the level of trust in the coaching staff and their ability to put each player in the best position to help both the team and the individual succeed.

“You don’t meet many coaches like Coach Harmon,” Jerry added. “He genuinely cares about you. You can see that he’s passionate about everything he does. If he asks you to do something, you will do it, without thinking twice. If he asks me to play receiver, I’ll do it. If he asked me to play kicker, I’d go do it. It’s really about the trust we have in Coach Harmon.”

But he did not make the transition on his own. New UMHB receivers coach Jeremy Harness played a pivotal role in Jerry’s development, as did Brock, who is the inspiration behind why Jerry wears No. 11 for the Cru.

“I had been struggling with blocking,” Jerry said in the fall of 2022, during his first season as a full-time receiver. “[Brock] texted me about it and helped me with playing receiver, because that was his position.”

A DAY THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING

March 22, 2019, is another day in Jerry’s life that he will never forget. Brock had begun experiencing painful headaches that would not go away. Doctors found that the headaches were a symptom of a serious brain tumor.

“We took him in, and the doctor looked at his eyes for seconds before saying, ‘We’ve got to get him an MRI,’” Stricklin remembers. “She made it happen that day, and 16 hours later, we were in emergency surgery, removing the tumor. When they came in to tell us he had the tumor, they told us to say our goodbyes because he wouldn’t make it.”

Jerry still gets emotional thinking back to when he heard that news. Since Jerry had come to live with them, he and Brock had developed an incredible bond, pushing each other to improve and being each other’s biggest supporter. It was Jerry who threw Brock the first touchdown of his high school career.

“They went to the hospital without me, because I was still in class,” Jerry recalls. “It came out of nowhere. We had no idea that was a problem. They texted me, and I went right to the hospital to be with him. That was one of the scariest things for me and my dad.”

“Jerry was naturally gifted, but at a young age, didn’t have much drive at all,” Stricklin recalls. “And Brock had all the drive. Early–morning workouts, to midday workouts, to evenings, and this was even before junior high. He just loved the game so much. It motivated Jerry.”

And just as Brock had continued to exceed expectations as he and Jerry made their marks on the gridiron, he overcame a hurdle the doctors thought was impossible.

“I didn’t come this far to only come this far,” Brock told them. “I’ll make it out of surgery. I’ll be back.”

He did just that, and more, on the road to recovery. A year of rehab followed, and during each session, the therapist would ask him to do 10 reps of various exercises or movements. But Brock refused to do 10. Instead, he did 11, because as he said, ‘That’s one day sooner that I get to go home.’”

“It inspired me,” Jerry said. “To see him get up and work as he could when he had the odds against him. To keep doing one extra rep every time inspired me to work harder in everything I do. Whenever I take the field, I know I’m going to go as hard as I can every snap because that’s exactly what he would do.”

Watching that hard-nosed mentality play out in addition to his versatile skill set, it is surprising to think that in ninth grade, Jerry considered quitting football altogether. It wasn’t because he didn’t love the sport anymore. He did. But as an all-round athlete with his skill set, basketball was calling, and it seemed he might have more potential on the court than the field.

“I actually was going to quit football my ninth-grade year,” Jerry remembers. “I stuck it out and chose the football route. But basketball definitely was a thought at first.”

FOOTBALL WINS OVER

Thankfully for UMHB, he stuck with football. But his prowess on the court continued through high school, as he helped lead Academy to a perfect 12-0 district record, the 3A Region III Championship, and a trip to the state semifinals.

“That was like a movie,” Jerry said of the incredible season. “That team was a family. We bonded together. That was one of my favorite experiences ever in high school. We really played for each other.”

A similar feeling came over him during his time at UMHB. Like his time at Academy, Jerry has been part of plenty of winning during his three seasons as a starting receiver. In the 2024 season alone, UMHB picked up a monumental win at UW-Whitewater in Week 3. And after dropping two regular-season matchups to conference rival Hardin-Simmons in the regular season, Jerry and the Crusaders got the better of the Cowboys in the second round of the Division III playoffs. With the 17-13 win in Abilene, the Cru booked its trip to the third round for the third time in the last four years.

But it’s also the chemistry that will stick with him long after he hangs up his cleats. He is part of the tradition, embraces the Code of the Cru, and relishes what it means to put on the purple and gold each Saturday.

The impact this program had on him, as a person just as much as an athlete, is not lost on him.

“The feeling of playing on this team is amazing,” Jerry said. “The people you meet, the guys you encounter; it’s an amazing feeling.”

Read the full-length story at True to the Cru.