What started as a tennis academy has become a football recruiting hotbed at IMG

Stephon Wynn Jr. wasn’t ready for IMG Academy a year ago.

Despite an opportunity to join one of the nation’s premier high school football programs, the 2018 Alabama commit didn’t think he was mature enough to leave his Anderson, S.C., home for Bradenton, Florida.

However, the four-star defensive end received another chance in late 2016 to join a boarding school that’s attracting a lot of attention. Knowing that he was going to play at an SEC school (he was down to Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina before announcing his decision July 1), being able to develop his game with some of the best training in the country was too good to pass up.

“We didn’t have that great of a season my junior season at T.L. Hanna,” Wynn said. “I was like, ‘Wow, (IMG) could really push me to the next level.’ I was good at T.L. Hanna, but I wasn’t next-level good yet.”

Xavier Thomas, the 2018 top-ranked defensive prospect in the country and Clemson commit, did the same thing when the defensive end chose to leave Wilson High in Florence last winter and spend his last year at IMG Academy.

“Those guys are getting challenged every day in practice because of the competition level and the coaching and all the things that we’re able to offer as an academy,” IMG coach Kevin Wright said.

The appeal

What started as a tennis academy in the 1970s has become a hotbed for high school football.

IMG purchased the school in 1987. Other sports were slowly added, and by 2013, a varsity football team with barely 50 participants began competing against Florida and national high schools.

Since then, the Ascenders have compiled a 37-3 record, and they’re splitting into two varsity teams this year, one that plays a national schedule and another that plays more locally. But winning isn’t necessarily the reason for going to IMG.

“We’ve got kids from 27 different states and eight different countries,” Wright said. “Our goal is to make you as good as you can be in a team setting. You’ve got to be unselfish to come here. You are going to give up a lot of things when you come here. Some of that is statistics. Some of that is playing time. Some of it’s not being ‘the guy.’ Not everybody is ready to do that when they’re 16 or 17 years old.”

At an academy that costs $72,500 per year to attend (financial aid is available), the best recruits in the country reach out to IMG, which is how Wright says he primarily fills his roster, to receive training that’s as close as they’ll get to college programs.

In 247Sports’ 2018 recruiting rankings, eight of the nation’s top 105 prospects, including Thomas and Wynn, are playing for IMG this fall.

When Alabama and Florida State play Sept. 3 in one of the most anticipated games of 2017, as many as seven IMG alumni could play prominent roles, including Crimson Tide running back Bo Scarbrough and Seminole quarterback Deondre Francois.

College coaches have been flocking to IMG recently. Wright estimates that around 200 of them a year have visited since he took over the program in 2015, but most of the players attending IMG aren’t there to get recruited. Many of them already have offers from or are verbally committed to major programs like Clemson, Alabama, Ohio State and Florida State.

“I think that (college coaches) are sold on what we’re doing,” Wright said. “It gives them a good snapshot on whether kids are ready to step in and play early.”

Wynn’s father, Stephon Wynn Sr., has known since his son was “knee high” that he had a “special talent,” and the family believed IMG would help cultivate it.

“South Carolina is great. I don’t have anything against the state, but if you want to be great and if you want to be able to compete, you’ve got to compete against the world,” said Wynn Sr., who played tight end at Clemson in the early 1990s.

Wynn Jr. says if not for IMG, he likely would be planning to redshirt his first year at Alabama, but now he’s hoping to make an immediate impact.

The competition, top-notch training staffs and expert nutrition plans are some of the advantages, but he also has a defensive line coach, Ernie Logan, who played 10 years in the NFL and learned from legendary coaches Bill Belichick and Bill Parcells.

Logan puts a heavy emphasis on technique at IMG. That can put a talented player like Thomas over the top.

“Xavier has unbelievable physical tools,” Wright said. “He’s about as explosive coming off the football as anybody I’ve been around. But he had to learn to be a better technician. He’s very physically gifted, but now every day you’re practicing against offensive linemen who are also very physically gifted.”

The demands

Attending IMG isn’t easy, and like in college, players have to buy into the mentality.

Many of them give up playing in their communities and leave their families for several months or years.

“The IMG guys are built differently,” Wynn said. “To do what we do in high school at our age, living away from our parents and doing things on our own, it’s different. It’s real hard. The average kid couldn’t do it. It helps you out when you get to college. You’re not going to get homesick.”

That’s also part of the training. Wright said the program is built on academics, and some prospects actually come for that more than the football.

During the fall, players typically start their day around 6 a.m., and they don’t get back to their dorm rooms until 6 p.m.

There are three 90-minute classes in the mornings that rotate daily and teach core curriculum.

Then there’s the football, which includes training, film study and practices. The day ends with an hour-and-a-half mandatory study session. Lights have to be out by 10:45 p.m.

Players don’t come and go as they please. It’s such a rigid schedule that Wright says former players laugh about the amount of free time they gain once they get to college.

“This isn’t for everybody, and by that I mean you have to be a very intrinsically motivated student-athlete to come to school here,” Wright said. “Ultimately, you have to do the work.”

This story was originally published July 24, 2017 at 5:49 PM.