By Brian Burnsed
NCAA.org
Jay Cutler didn’t see him.
But Jerrell Freeman was accustomed to being overlooked. Five years removed from his final college snap, the Indianapolis Colts linebacker was finally playing in his first NFL regular season game. He even spent his time in college playing out of the limelight at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor in Division III. So it’s no surprise that, on the Chicago Bears’ second offensive series of the 2012 season, Jay Cutler didn’t see Freeman sprinting out to the flat; it’s no surprise that the quarterback might not have even known No. 50’s name.
But, seconds later, Freeman introduced himself.
Freeman broke out in 2012 when he led the Colts in tackles, amassed two sacks, an interception and forced a fumble.
Only a few plays into his NFL debut, Freeman sprinted in front of Cutler’s pass, snagged it and, without breaking stride, bolted into the Bears’ end zone. In an instant, he’d silenced more than 60,000 at Soldier Field. Through the rest of the season, he pulled thousands of Colts fans to their feet, amassing 145 tackles – fifth most in the NFL – while securing a starting spot. But with newfound fame and potential riches ahead of him, Freeman hasn’t turned his back on his humble past. Rather, he’s embraced the small university in the heart of Texas where his promising career began.
After his breakout 2012 season with the Colts, Freeman returned to Mary Hardin-Baylor during the 2013 spring semester to finish the 11 credit hours that stood between him and a degree in criminal justice. On Saturday, May 4, he traded in his blue and white uniform for a cap and gown and accepted a diploma from the school’s president Randy O’Rear.
“It’s a long way from Division III football to the National Football League,” O’Rear said. “When you have a guy that goes off and plays at the highest level of his sport, but degree completion is important enough to him to come back and get that finished, boy, that’s something we’re really proud of.”
Though he pursued his dreams of playing professional football, Freeman never forgot the promise he’d made to his parents – no matter what came next, he would graduate from college. Even after securing a starting spot on an NFL playoff team, he wouldn’t renege on that pledge. So, before the Colts ventured to Baltimore for the opening week of the playoffs, he texted Steve Theodore, Mary Hardin-Baylor’s senior vice president for administration and chief operating officer. Freeman wanted to come back; what would he need to do to earn his diploma?
“Coming out of high school, education was a big thing for [my family],” Freeman said. “Even now when I go out and talk to kids, I try to preach education, because it has allowed me to do the things I do now.”
Theodore dug into Freeman’s academic records and found that he was only a handful of classes shy from completing his degree. Theodore told the former D3football.com Defensive Player of the Year that he should be able to complete the coursework in time to walk at the school’s commencement in May. After the eventual Super Bowl champion Baltimore Ravens knocked the Colts out of the playoffs in January, Freeman and Theodore worked to find him an apartment on campus and to enroll him in classes. Soon, Freeman was more than 1,000 miles away from the stadium he’d made roar, sitting in quiet classrooms like any other student.
Seemingly, an NFL starter roaming the campus of a Division III school that’s home to fewer than 3,000 undergraduate students would cause a stir. And while Freeman noted that he occasionally heard a whisper or two from awestruck classmates, he blended easily back into life as a student and didn’t prove to be a distraction, school officials agreed.
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