LaNorris Sellers, the architect? Inside the South Carolina QB’s summer side gig
LaNorris Sellers is not fazed because nothing’s new. This is basically what he did in fifth grade. Except, well, there are more people. More stakes. More money. More intricacies. More reasons for intimidation, to pipe down and slink out of sight.
But this is Sellers’ dream. If he can’t swim in the big pond, then perhaps the dream is too much.
Granted, the dream might still be 10 or 20 years away — after football is done and he can finally transition into architecture.
South Carolina’s star quarterback has already planned out his post-football life. His life as an architect. Heck, he’s been plotting his long-term career since the fifth grade — back when he was part of Florence 1 school district’s gifted program, “REACH.”
“He took a class and he drew a blueprint of his (future) house,” said Sellers’ mom, Cheryl Ford. “He literally just wanted to draw houses and bridges.”
“Ever since then,” Sellers said, “I’ve just been in love with it.”
He was enamored by design, less so by the construction. Sellers was not a tinkerer. There were no Legos in the Sellers household. No Popsicle-stick bridges. No wild DIY projects. Just blueprints and a career path.
Because South Carolina does not offer a major in architecture, he enrolled in college as an engineering major, which didn’t last long. The classes weren’t about, well, architecture. Mix that with trying to balance engineering classes with football and, not long after, he tweaked his plan.
“The next thing to that in the sports world would be stadiums,” Sellers said. “So I can do that, get a degree in that, then get a master’s in architecture since (I’ll) already have a bachelor in sports management.”
Before any of that was possible, he needed to pass an internship class. Which is how Sellers found himself in boardrooms surrounded by some of the brightest minds in the architecture and design worlds, formulating ideas on how to best renovate the stadium he electrifies on Saturdays.
Inside LaNorris Sellers’ internship
Greg Hughes began working with South Carolina’s most famous intern a few months ago. After Sellers expressed his desire to learn architecture, staff at USC reached out to Hughes, asking if Contract Construction needed a summer intern.
He, of course, was happy to oblige.
Now, importantly, Hughes — Contract Construction’s CEO — does not run an architecture business. He is the one deciphering the blueprints, rather than drawing them — working with the architects to turn their designs into a real-world structure.
“We’re trying to give him a peek behind the curtains,” said Hughes, a ‘94 grad of USC. “What design is like. What architects do. What the contractors do. And how we work in conjunction together.”
Contract Construction has been a fixture around South Carolina, responsible for the building of over 30 projects on the USC-Columbia campus, including Founders Park, the football facility, dorms and plenty of academic buildings.
Their current behemoth is the renovation of Williams-Brice Stadium, which has required Hughes — and his intern — to attend numerous meetings with the top brass at the Populous, one of the top sports architecture firms in the world, Manhattan Construction Group and the South Carolina athletics department.
“He’s in there listening, taking notes,” said USC athletic director Jeremiah Donati. “It’s super impressive. I’ve probably been in six hours of meetings with (LaNorris).”
“He’s like a sponge,” added Gamecock Club CEO Wayne Hiott: “He’ll lean over to Greg a lot and ask questions and Greg will lean over and fill him in on different topics.”
There are a few topics, though, where the entire room looks to Sellers for input. Part of the Williams-Brice renovation includes building a new visitors locker room — a change more about logistics than making opponents feel like they’re at the Four Seasons.
LaNorris, any opinions?
“It’s a smaller locker room. If there’s a lot of lockers, (then) they’ve got to talk around the lockers,” Sellers said. “It doesn’t need to be all pretty. They don’t need to go in there and be comfortable.”
Another idea floating around these meetings revolved around the student section. As part of the upgrades, there will be a club-like, air-conditioned area for students and perhaps a few other student section upgrades. An idea thrown around: Do they ditch “The Cockpit” name? If so, what should the student section be called?
LaNorris, what do you think?
“I talked to a couple (teammates). I talked to a couple students I know from back home,” Sellers said. “There’s Cockpit. Some were like the actual Gamecock: (Thomas) Sumter. Like Sumter names. … I gave them like 10 or 12 names.”
To Sellers, none of this is beneath him, least of all naming a student section that he’s never sat in. He could’ve chucked out some easy ideas, asked ChatGPT for a few names, but instead he decides he needs real input. So the starting quarterback starts messaging people from high school, polling them about a hypothetical name change to ensure he can deliver a dozen unique names to his boss.
“I mean, if I’m gonna do it, I’m gonna take it seriously,” Sellers said. “I’m not gonna waste anyone’s time. … It’s actually serious because you want to make a good impression on these people. They can help you after football.”
Life after football
When Sellers began the internship, Hughes made one thing crystal clear: Football comes first.
So every Sunday throughout the summer, Hughes would text Sellers his weekly schedule and Sellers would shoot back with what he could and couldn’t attend. Naturally, this varied — five hours during one week, 20 hours another.
If all goes well, Sellers will be in the NFL by next summer. His bank account will include two commas with many more millions on the way. And it’s not only that he doesn’t count on that happening, he’s preparing for a world in which it doesn’t. Or maybe a world where it does and he’s 40 with plenty of working years in him.
“I just admire the fact he’s not assuming,” Hughes said. “He’s wise enough to just think about other options are out there — whether it’s now or a future after the NFL.”
Hughes tried to refrain from bringing Sellers to too many job sites, out of fear every worker would pester the intern for pictures. But, almost everywhere else, Sellers is shadowing Hughes.
“He goes to sales meetings with me, lunches. He goes to just every meeting I go to,” said Hughes. “We’ll be in the meetings and he’ll be texting me back and forth — because we don’t want to be rude and whisper — asking good questions about what I’m looking at and I’ll explain it.”
One time, Hughes took a client to play golf so, naturally, Sellers tagged along. Midway through the round, Sellers apologized: “Sorry, I’m not playing well.” Hughes responded, “Well, I’m not a good quarterback, so that makes us even.”
“I’m trying to show him the construction industry is not all work,” Hughes added. “Some of it’s fun.”
Time will tell whether the internship sways Sellers’ dreams from architecture to construction. In the meantime, Hughes is just excited for the fall. When he can look on from his seats in the 2001 Club (“The one we build,” he says with a laugh) and watch the man whose internship papers he signed.
“I’ll be watching him the whole game, rooting for him,” Hughes said. “I’ll text him after the game and tell him congratulations for the seven touchdowns he threw and the four he ran for.”
This story was originally published August 14, 2025 at 7:00 AM.
