Exclusive: Lake Minneola 3-star safety Ethon Cole announces college decision

Editor’s note: Lake Minneola rising senior safety Ethon Cole has written the following first-person story to announce where he’ll play college football.

The 6-foot-2, 190-pound Cole is a three-star recruit, the No. 98 safety in the nation and the No. 183 overall player in Florida on the 247Sports composite rankings. He has more than a dozen offers, including Duke, Indiana, Minnesota and Purdue.

Cole recorded 21 tackles, was tied for second on the team with four passes defended and recovered a fumble in 2021. The three-year varsity player helped Lake Minneola reach the Class 6A state championship game in 2020.

Football and sports have been a part of my life since I was 3. Since then, it’s always been my dream to make it to the NFL.

And I’ve always put in the work.

When I was in the seventh grade, I worked out with the varsity football team during the summer. I did it because I wanted to play varsity football as a freshman.

I’m really close with my head coach and my brother was just starting high school, so I just went with him. I learned a lot from that. I learned how to fight through adversity.

It was just my goal. I had to play varsity as a freshman. I did not want to touch the JV field and I never did. Coach let me work out and accomplish my goal.

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It felt really good playing varsity as a freshman. I’m the only player here who has ever played the entire varsity season as a freshman. It feels crazy but I felt that I deserved it because I put in the work.

I for sure got my work ethic from my father. He’s been pushing me to be my best since I was little. If I want to be good, I have to put in the work.

I also got a lot of motivation from mom, my big brother, my grandparents and my support system. They were always around to encourage me, but the biggest factor was dad.

I want to thank God for giving me the ability to play the sport of football and blessing me with this opportunity. I would like to thank coach Walter Banks and coach Lo Wood. They’ve been with me throughout the whole recruiting process and helped me a lot — either by putting my name out there or letting me know what to do to get where I’m at.

I feel like this is just the process of me getting to be the best I can be. College is another milestone to being the best I can be.

I’m excited to announce that for the next three to four years I’ll be attending Purdue University.

I picked Purdue because the education stood out to me. It had a lot of benefits. An education from Purdue will set me up for success beyond football.

Coach Ron English has a lot of history coaching and he has a good background. He’s been a head coach before, and he’s put a lot of defensive backs in the NFL. That was really important for me. I’ll be in good hands and I wanted to feel confident with that.

I really liked the facilities, too and they told me about the improvements that they’re making. But, for me, it’s about the people inside the facilities. The better the relationship I had with my position coach, I felt like that was really important.

Coach English knows a lot and he can bring out my best and get me to where I want to go.

#Boiler Up

This article originally appeared on Daily Commercial: Exclusive: Lake Minneola 3-star S Ethon Cole announces college decision