A Connecticut native is making waves in Texas as the only DIII football player to have been invited to play in the East West Shrine Bowl last week. He has his sights set higher.
The Killingworth product is still down in Texas chasing his NFL dream, and he’s putting in the work to get there.
Thomas Perry is a current Middlebury College senior, and within the last week he has taken a major step in the right direction by shining in front of NFL scouts and coaches while competing against some incredible DI-level talent.
“It was pretty cool seeing someone from our school play at such a high level like that. Yeah, you don’t see that much, but it’s cool,” Hunter Lesle, a senior at Haddam Killingworth High School, Perry’s alma mater, said.
Haddam Killingworth High School isn’t often turning out NFL caliber football players, and more precisely, it never has. But alumni Thomas Perry is taking steps closer, and plenty of seniors on the football team are taking notice.
“And it really shows that it’s all about hard work. You can go anywhere as long as you work,” Lesle said.
Perry is a graduate with the class of 2021 and attended Middlebury College in Vermont where he is currently a senior on the football team. He was invited to play in the Shrine Bowl over the summer while working with a coach down in Texas and has been getting after it ever since.
The game according to coach’s familiar is considered a premiere showcase of some of the best college football players in the country. NFL scouts and coaches attend ahead of the NFL combine and draft.
“It’s tough because they may not get as much exposure, but Thomas did the right things. He did the hard work. He got those academics down,” current head coach of HK’s football team, Tyler Wilcox, said.
He explained HK plays in the Pequot conference of Class S here in Connecticut. It’s a small conference that often doesn’t receive recognition or scouting opportunities like the larger schools and conferences.
He, along with the entire coaching staff, are beaming with pride for their former student-athlete. Wilcox, along with a fellow coach, got to head down to the game.
“Thomas is here, this is awesome for the school, for the town, for his family, for him, and we’re excited for what happens next,” Wilcox said.
Perry stepped out of his comfort zone and played center in the game, and despite not being in his usual spot in the interior of the offensive line, he thrived, driving a defender into the end zone, clearing the way for a touchdown run and catching a pass during a trick play on a 2-point conversion attempt.
NFL Network singled him out on their “X” feed and scouts were being tagged in the comments so they could take note.
Ask Perry, though, and he’s humble about the whole experience.
When asked about the opportunity, he immediately started thanking coaches, going back to his time at home working with strength coaches on Connecticut’s shoreline like Rob Mangino and Ron Lelko.
He also named current coaches and trainers he’s working with like Duke Manyweather and coaches from Middlebury like Dave Caputi, Ryan Paquette and Doug Mandigo.
He rattled off names of coaches going back to his early football days, thanking each one before he started talking about the trip to Texas.
When asked about the game, he couldn’t help but smile.
“I was very happy to have the opportunity to play, I was very happy and to hear I got invited,” Perry said in a Zoom call from a Texas hotel room.
He is still down there training for a potential NFL combine invite or pro day. He’ll return to Middlebury to finish his degree in about a month.
For him, it’s about the love of the game and the grind, regardless of what the future holds.
“Work hard, and push yourself, it’s fun to get to work hard and go to the weight room and enjoy pushing yourself,” Perry said. “I’m having a blast, getting this opportunity. Every opportunity I get, I will do the most I can and take advantage of it.”
He applies that work ethic to his education, too. He’s a molecular biology and biochemistry major with a minor in math. Stopping in the halls of Haddam Killingworth High School and teachers will tell you he was, and is, a great role model for students.
“You just tell him what to do and he would do it and you’d tell him once and then he’d do it the rest of the season. That’s just who he was,” Barth Keck, a football coach and English teacher at the high school, said.
He worked with Perry on the football field, and in AP English courses. Keck said students have been paying attention to what Perry has been up to, but teachers from all departments who knew him are really buzzing.
Many bringing lessons right back home to the hallways of HK, applying them with current students.
“Thomas is kind of the role model for them,” Keck said, “and I think the most important thing to tell them is that it’s the combination of hard work and, using your natural abilities, your smarts, you put those two together, you can basically accomplish anything you want.”
While the 6-foot-3 lineman may have left big shoes to fill, those in the school’s weight room, classrooms or hallways walking in the same spots, inspired by what coaches and teachers said was one of Perry’s best characteristics – his work ethic.
“In your classes, you’re there for a reason, you might as well. You also go for it because you never know where you can go,” fellow football player and senior Trevor Dixon said.
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