PENDLETON — With the two top running backs for Pendleton Heights having graduated, Evan Suter entered his own senior season in the mix to play the position. That would mean crowds screaming his name, attention and the adoration that goes with scoring touchdowns.
After a request from his coaches, Suter is passing on all that and changing positions on offense. He’ll be moving to the offensive line — a thankless but important position. Coach Jed Richman said it was a move designed to take advantage of Suter’s physical strength.
“He’s leading by example all the time with his effort and strength,” Richman said. “He is our strongest guy in the weight room — I wish I looked like him. It’s pretty selfless of him to switch positions like this.”
For Suter, who is also the team’s signal caller on defense at middle linebacker, moving from running back to guard was not what he wanted at first. But he has warmed to the move, thinking of his teammates first.
“Initially — I won’t lie — I was a little disappointed,” he said. “But in the end, this is my last year and the last time I will ever play with these guys again. I had to suck it up, and I’m good now. That’s my family over there, and I’m not going to leave them hanging. I’ll have their backs 100 percent.”
“He won’t be coming off the field much at all,” Richman added.
Suter, a starter at linebacker since late in his freshman year, said Pendleton Heights football is everything to him.
“I got lucky my freshman year — I got to start the last few games due to injury and a disciplinary thing,” he said. “I fell in love. Football, as a sport, is like no other, in my opinion. We’re all out there, embracing the heat, embracing the sun. It brings you closer together; this is my family.”
Suter said optimism is high heading into the second season of coach Richman’s system. He said one goal this year is to erase the embarrassment of the past three losses to New Palestine.
“Two years in a row, New Pal has put outrageous numbers up that should never happen in a football game,” he said. “This year is it — we have to stand up to them.”
Richman said Suter is a model for what he wants his football players to be — not just selfless and hard-working on the field but excelling in the classroom.
“He’s an exceptional student, too,” Richman said. “He exemplifies the student-athlete for sure. He’s high character, gets it done in the classroom. I hope he’s my doctor one of these days.”
That is, in fact, a possibility.
“I know it will be difficult, but I want to try med school,” Suter said. “I’ll try either pharmacy, or our team doctor got me interested in sports medicine when I broke my hand.”
In case med school doesn’t work out, Suter said he has a fall back career in mind: Petroleum engineering.